Coin guides

Bitcoin is the original cryptocurrency, launched in January 2009 by the pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto as a peer-to-peer electronic cash system secured by proof-of-work mining. It remains the largest crypto asset by market value and the reference point most other coins are compared against.

Ethereum, launched in 2015, introduced general-purpose smart contracts to blockchains, becoming the base layer for most DeFi, NFT and stablecoin activity. It moved from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake in the September 2022 event known as The Merge.

Solana, launched in 2020, is a high-throughput layer-1 designed for low fees and fast finality, combining proof-of-stake consensus with a proof-of-history mechanism that timestamps transactions before they're ordered. It has become a major hub for DeFi, NFTs and consumer/meme-token activity.

XRP is the native asset of the XRP Ledger, launched in 2012 by Ripple Labs and designed for fast, low-cost cross-border payments and liquidity settlement rather than general smart contracts. All XRP was created at the ledger's genesis; none is mined or staked.

BNB launched in 2017 as Binance's exchange utility token and now also secures BNB Chain, an EVM-compatible smart-contract network run by a rotating set of validators under a proof-of-staked-authority model. It is used for trading-fee discounts, gas on BNB Chain, and various ecosystem programmes.

Cardano, launched in 2017, is a proof-of-stake layer-1 built on the Ouroboros consensus protocol, developed through peer-reviewed academic research and rolled out in named eras (Byron, Shelley, Goguen, and onward). Its native token, ADA, is used for staking, fees and on-chain governance.

Dogecoin launched in 2013 as a joke based on the 'Doge' meme, running a proof-of-work chain forked from Litecoin. It has no fixed supply cap by design, and despite its origins has become one of the most widely held and liquid coins, boosted periodically by high-profile social-media attention.

Polkadot, launched in 2020 by the Web3 Foundation, is a proof-of-stake network built around a central relay chain that connects and secures independent 'parachains', aiming to let specialised blockchains interoperate and share security rather than each bootstrapping their own validator set.

Litecoin, launched in 2011 by Charlie Lee as a fork of Bitcoin's codebase, was designed for faster block times and a Scrypt mining algorithm, positioning itself as a lighter-weight complement to Bitcoin for payments. It is one of the longest-running altcoins still in active use.

Stellar, launched in 2014 by Jed McCaleb (a co-founder of Ripple), is a payments-focused network aimed at cross-border transfers and asset issuance, using its own federated-agreement consensus model rather than mining or conventional staking. Its annual inflation mechanism was removed in 2019.

NEAR Protocol, launched in 2020, is a sharded proof-of-stake layer-1 built around a design called Nightshade, aiming for high throughput while keeping development approachable through human-readable account names rather than hex addresses.

Shiba Inu launched in 2020 as an ERC-20 token on Ethereum, styled as a 'Dogecoin killer' and built entirely around meme culture rather than a technical roadmap. It has no consensus mechanism of its own — it inherits Ethereum's security as a token rather than running its own chain — though its ecosystem has since added a companion layer-2, Shibarium.

Tether (USDT), launched in 2014, is the largest stablecoin by usage, issued by Tether Limited and pegged 1:1 to the US dollar. It is issued across many blockchains (as a token, not its own chain) and is backed by a reserve of cash, cash equivalents and other assets that Tether publishes attestations of periodically.

USD Coin (USDC), launched in 2018 by Circle (originally under the Centre consortium with Coinbase), is a US-dollar-pegged stablecoin issued across multiple blockchains and backed by cash and short-dated US Treasuries, with monthly reserve attestations published by Circle.

Avalanche, launched in 2020 by Ava Labs, is a proof-of-stake layer-1 built around its own Avalanche consensus protocol and a multi-chain architecture (the X, C and P-Chains), pitched on fast finality and letting projects launch custom application-specific chains ('subnets').

Polygon began in 2017 as Matic Network, an Ethereum-scaling proof-of-stake sidechain, and has since expanded into a wider family of scaling technologies including zk-rollups. Its native token migrated from MATIC to POL in 2024 to underpin the broader multi-chain Polygon ecosystem.

Chainlink, launched in 2017 (mainnet 2019), is a decentralised oracle network rather than its own blockchain — it feeds real-world data (prices, events, randomness) to smart contracts on Ethereum and many other chains. LINK is used to pay node operators and, in newer versions, to secure the network via staking.

TRON, launched in 2018 by Justin Sun, is a layer-1 using delegated proof-of-stake with a small set of elected 'super representative' validators, aimed at high throughput and low fees. It is also, alongside Ethereum, one of the two chains most USDT is issued and transferred on.

Toncoin runs on The Open Network, a proof-of-stake, infinitely-shardable layer-1 originally designed by Telegram's core team and open-sourced in 2019 after Telegram exited the project; an independent community has since developed it, with Telegram integrating TON-based wallets and mini-apps into its messaging app.

Arbitrum, built by Offchain Labs and launched to mainnet in 2021, is an optimistic-rollup layer-2 that executes transactions off Ethereum's main chain and posts compressed proofs back to it, cutting fees while inheriting Ethereum's underlying security. The ARB governance token followed in March 2023.