[Crypto Q&A] What's the Difference between Bitcoin & Ethereum?

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The difference between Ethereum and Bitcoin is the fact that Bitcoin is nothing more than a currency, whereas Ethereum is a ledger technology that companies are using to build new programs. Both Bitcoin and Ethereum operate on what is called “blockchain” technology, however Ethereum's is far more robust.

Ether and bitcoin are similar in many ways: each is a digital currency traded via online exchanges and stored in various types of cryptocurrency wallets. Both of these tokens are decentralized, meaning that they are not issued or regulated by a central bank or other authority. Both make use of the distributed ledger technology known as blockchain. However, there are also many crucial distinctions between the two most popular cryptocurrencies by market cap. Below, we'll take a closer look at the similarities and differences between bitcoin and ether.

Ethereum differs from Bitcoin in 7 main ways: 1. In Ethereum the block time is set to twelve seconds compared to Bitcoins 10 minutes. This allows for faster transaction times. Ethereum does this by using the Ghost protocol. 2. Ethereum has a slightly different economic model than Bitcoin – Bitcoin block rewards halve every 4 years whilst Ethereum releases the same amount of Ether each year ad infinitum. 3. Ethereum has a different method for costing transactions depending on their computational complexity, bandwidth use and storage needs. Bitcoin transactions compete equally with each other. This is called Gas in Ethereum and is limited per block whilst in Bitcoin it is limited by the block size. 4. Ethereum has its own Turing complete internal code... a Turing complete code means that given enough computing power and enough time... anything can be calculated. With Bitcoin there is not this form of flexibility. 5. Ethereum was crowd funded whilst Bitcoin was released and early miners own most of the coins that will ever be mined. With Ethereum 50% of the coins will be owned by miners in year five. 6. Ethereum discourages centralised pool mining through its Ghost protocol rewarding stale blocks. There is no advantage to being in a pool in terms of block propagation. 7. Ethereum uses a memory hard hashing algorithm called Ethash that mitigates against the use of ASICS, and encourages decentralised mining by individuals using their GPU’s.

PreviousNext Tutorial Playlist Of the more than 1,600 available cryptocurrencies on the market, Bitcoin and Ethereum are both in the top three. And Ethereum may overtake Bitcoin in 2018, according to Forbes, which cites the platform’s aggressive growth. But how exactly does Ethereum stack up against Bitcoin in terms of features, uses, and more? Simplilearn’s Bitcoin vs. Ethereum tutorial video covers the similarities and differences between these two cryptocurrencies, and here we’ll recap what’s included in the video. In 1999, Nobel Prize winner in economics Milton Friedman believed the Internet was going to be one of the major forces in reducing the role of government. He also thought that the one thing missing was reliable electronic cash, and just as he predicted, in 2009 the cryptocurrency Bitcoin was born. What is Cryptocurrency? Before going into the Bitcoin vs. Ethereum debate and trying to find out if Ethereum is better than Bitcoin, you must first know about cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrency works in a very similar way to “normal” currency (the dollar, Euro, Pound, yen, rupee, and so on). Any form of currency that isn’t a cryptocurrency falls under the banner of normal currency, also known as fiat currency. The major difference between cryptocurrencies and fiat currencies is that cryptocurrencies are decentralized. This means that cryptocurrencies don’t have a central authority, such as a bank or government, controlling them. In a way, cryptocurrency works in a very democratic fashion: any change that needs to take place is done only after a majority of the people using the cryptocurrency agree to it. What is Cryptocurrency Cryptocurrencies and fiat currencies are similar because both were created as a medium of exchange. However, that’s where the similarity ends. With cryptocurrencies, third parties are not involved. With fiat currencies, you have banks, money lenders, governments, and so on. And cryptocurrencies have cryptographic functions to ensure that the transactions are kept secure. Bitcoin, for example, uses the SHA-256 algorithm to ensure security. But most important, cryptocurrencies use blockchain, which is a set of records that are placed into a container known as a block. These transactions are kept public and in chronological order. Offer Expires In 00 : HRS 51 : MIN 02 SEC Blockchain Career Guide A Guide to Becoming a Blockchain DeveloperDOWNLOAD NOW What is Bitcoin? Bitcoin, which was released in 2009 by an individual or group of individuals known as Satoshi Nakamoto, is a cryptocurrency that allows people to send and receive money around the world. As mentioned, the payments are secured using cryptography. The most essential point about Bitcoin is that it helps keep the identity of the people sending and receiving money anonymously. The transaction fee is also very low. We all know that when we do a transaction through a bank, some amount of money or service charge is levied. However, with Bitcoin, this charge is very low. What is Bitcoin? What is Ethereum? Ethereum, which was created in 2015 by Vitalik Buterin, is a cryptocurrency that provides ether tokens. This is equivalent to bitcoins in the Bitcoin network. Ether is used to build and deploy decentralized applications whose back-end code is placed in a distributed peer-to-peer network. This is different from a regular application, for which the back-end code is placed in a centralized server. Ether is also used to pay for services, like the computational power that is required before a block can be added to the blockchain and to pay transaction fees. Ether works very similarly to Bitcoin and can be used for peer-to-peer payments. Also, it can be used to create smart contracts. Smart contracts work in such a way that when a specific set of predefined rules is satisfied, a particular output takes place. What is Ethereum? Bitcoin vs. Ethereum This argument of Bitcoin vs. Ethereum has been gaining great hype in recent times. Bitcoin has become a very popular and well-known cryptocurrency around the world. It also has the highest market cap among all the cryptocurrencies available right now. In a way, it’s the current world champion when it comes to cryptocurrencies. On the other side is Ethereum. Ethereum did not have the revolutionary effect that Bitcoin did, but its creator learned from Bitcoin and produced more functionalities based on the concepts of Bitcoin. It is the second-most-valuable cryptocurrency on the market right now.

Bitcoin was designed purely as a digital currency. The ethereum blockchain is a more general implementation of blockchain technology.

Around 3 month ago the different from BTC and ETH is BTC use PoW, ETH use PoS and now ETH changed to PoW

Both Bitcoin and Ethereum operate on what is called “blockchain” technology, however Ethereum's is far more robust.

not significant

i think the consensus

not really different, same as crypto