Comparison of cryptocurrencies
This article aims to list relevant cryptocurrencies.
To be listed here, a currency must have one of the following qualities:
- The currency must have a market cap of one million US dollars.
- The currency must be the first to introduce an innovative protocol.
- The currency must have at one point had significant notoriety.
- The currency must have been an infamous fraud.
These coins are currently ordered according to Launched date.
| Coin | Ticker | Launched | Consensus tool | Distribution | Market cap | Unit cap | Status | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Bitcoin
|
BTC | 3 Jan 2009 | SHA256d | Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | $6.34 billion | 20,999,999.9769 | Active | First blockchain |
| Bitcoin Testnet 1
|
TNBTC | 21 Oct 2010 | SHA256d | Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | None | 20,999,999.9769 | Abandoned | First altcoin[1] |
| Tonal Bitcoin
|
TBC | 2 Jan 2011 | Pegged to Bitcoin | 7,750,54.00 | Active | First on-chain alternative | ||
| Ripple | XRP | 1 Mar 2011 | Ripple | Central | $139 million | 28,989,252,282 | Active | |
 Namecoin
|
NMC | 18 Apr 2011 | SHA256d - merged mined with Bitcoin | Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | $11.14 million | 20,999,999.9769 | Active | First alternative chain, bitDNS |
| Tenebrix | TBX | 25 Sep 2011 | scrypt | Central, Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | None | 10,499,999.9769 | Dead | First scrypt coin |
 Litecoin
|
LTC | 7 Oct 2011 | scrypt | Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | $154 million | 83,999,949.9076 | Active | TBX clone |
| Bitcoin Testnet 3
|
TNBTC | 12 Apr 2012 | SHA256d | Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | None | 20,999,999.9769 | Active | Current Bitcoin testnet |
| Bytecoin | BCN | 4 Jul 2012 | CryptoNight | Proof-of-work (random, smooth) | $2.73 million | 184.46 billion | Active | First CryptoNote coin |
 Peercoin
|
PPC | 19 Aug 2012 | Central authoriy[2] | Proof-of-work/stake | $15.5 million | Unlimited | Active | |
| Freicoin | FRC | 21 Dec 2012 | SHA256d | Proof-of-work | $84 thousand | ? | Active | First demurrage cryptocurrency |
| Feathercoin | FTC | 16 Apr 2013 | scrypt | Proof-of-work (fixed, halving) | $1.15 million | ? | Active | LTC hardfork |
| Anoncoin | ANC | 2 Jun 2013 | Zerocoin | Zero-knowledge proofs | ? | 4,200,000 | Developed | Built in support of I2P and Tor. Zerocoin will be implemented in an upcoming release |
| Primecoin | XPM | 7 Jul 2013 | Cunningham | Proof-of-work | $1.2 million | Unlimited | Active | First "useful proof-of-work" altcoin |
 BitSharesX
|
BTSX | 29 Sep 2013 | Consensus through obscurity | ? | $66.5 million | 1,999,992,536 | Active | |
 Nxt
|
NXT | 29 Sep 2013 | Consensus through obscurity[3] | Central | $29.0 million | 999,997,096 | Active | |
 Dogecoin
|
DOGE | 6 Dec 2013 | scrypt | Proof-of-work (random) | $12.7 million | Unlimited | Active | Was joke, became huge |
 Dash (formerly known as Darkcoin and XCoin)
|
DASH | 18 Jan 2014 | X11 | Proof-of-work (fixed, curve) | $12.5 million | 19 million (estimate) | Active | |
 HunterCoin
|
HUC | 1 Feb 2014 | SHA256d and/or scrypt | Game rewards, Proof-of-work | $47 thousand | 42,000,000 | Active | First blockchain-based game |
 Monero
|
XMR | 18 Apr 2014 | CryptoNight | Proof-of-work (random, smooth) | $6.27 million | ~18,400,000 then <1% inflation | Active | |
 MaidSafeCoin
|
MAID | 22 Apr 2014 | Bitcoin | Central | $8.54 million | 452,552,412 | Active | |
| ZeroVert | ZER | 5 Nov 2014 | Zerocoin | Scrypt-N, merge-mineable on the VTC chain | ? | 8,400,000 | Active | First cryptocurrency that integrated the Zerocoin extention. |
| Zcash | ZEC | 28 Oct 2016 | Zerocash | Zero-knowledge proofs, Proof-of-work (Equihash), with a portion of each block subsidy distributed to founders for the first four years. | $66.63 million | 21,000,000 | Active | Less prone to privacy timing attacks than Zcoin. |
| Zclassic | ZCL | ? | Zerocash | (See Zcash) | ? | ? | Active | ? |
| Zcoin | XZC | 28 Sep 2016 | Zerocoin | Zero-knowledge proofs | ? | ? | Active | The first Zero-knowledge proof based anonymous cryptocurrency. |