Crypto vs. Internet Adoption Rate: the path to 1 billion users
The cryptocurrency space’s adoption rate has seemingly been booming, but in the grand schemes of things it has so far been on par with the adoption rate of other nascent technologies we’ve seen in our generation. While that may seem slow, it suggests crypto will have over a billion users by 2027.
As cryptocurrency networks grow so do its effects on the wider population, in a way similar to the one the internet’s growth exploded with the rise of home computers and an increase in ease of use and use cases alike.
Late last year, cryptocurrency influencer Lark Davis tweeted out a chart from Coinbase showing that the total number of cryptocurrency users from 2014 to 2022 has almost perfectly mirrored the number of users the internet had from 1990 to 1998.
The chart suggests there are about 200 million crypto users throughout the world right now, and that this figure could rise 5x to 1 billion by 2027 — merely five years from now. As most cryptocurrencies have extremely limited supplies, it is presumable that the price of most will explode with such hyper adoption.
Crypto’s hyper adoption phase
In February 2022, investment banking giant Wells Fargo has corroborated Coinbase’s findings in a note sent to clients, where it suggested crypto is near a phase of hyper adoption similar to that of the internet in the mid-to-late 1990s.
According to Wells Fargo’s report, these new technologies have seen adoption typically start slowly but then they “hit an inflection point, and then steeply accelerated.” In 1995, the report adds, 14% of U.S. adults had internet access, but that rate skyrocketed to 46% by 2000.
Like the internet back then, Wells Fargo noted crypto “could soon hit a hyper-inflection point.” It adds that around 13% of Americans bought or traded cryptocurrencies in the last 12 months, showing an adoption rate similar to that of the internet.
What could trigger crypto’s hyper adoption phase is unclear. Various countries, including most recently Ukraine, which was ranked fourth in Chainalysis’ 2021 Global Crypto Adoption Index before the move, have now legalized cryptocurrencies.
On the other hand, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have been seeing wider adoption from mainstream tech firms. The CEO of Meta, formerly known as Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg has recently confirmed NFTs are coming to Instagram and its billions of users.
Web 3.0 and crypto’s adoption rate
Whether NFTs are the next big thing or people turn to cryptocurrencies because of necessity, the fact that there are a number of ways cryptocurrency adoption could explode in the near future suggests the event is likely.
Web 3.0, the next phase of the evolution of the internet built on top of decentralized, verifiable, and uncensorable smart contracts that allow for peer-to-peer transactions, could be at its center.
OMNIA Protocol, a decentralized infrastructure protocol that helps prevent single points of failure by optimizing privacy and rewarding infrastructure providers, is likely to be a part of the hyper adoption phase, although it may remain unnoticed for most users as it acts to protect them in the background.
The protocol offers users privacy and ensures node operators are rewarded for keeping blockchain performance as good as it can be. This means transactions made through it both remain cheap and settle quickly, while guaranteeing users’ privacy and protections against a number of potential attacks.
OMNIA Protocol has already implemented integrations such as private mempools, which protect users against frontrunning. OMNIA Protocol’s offerings, including mixnets, private mempools, and incentives for node operators, are currently in a freemium model but can easily be moved into a payable format.
About OMNIA Protocol
By foreseeing the state of the current blockchain application network, we have committed to preparing, researching, and applying our technical expertise to our latest project, OMNIA.
OMNIA Protocol is a decentralized infrastructure protocol for securely accessing the blockchain so that no single point of failure will ever disrupt blockchain applications or wallets integrating with it.
OMNIA’s solution is truly decentralized and requires zero technical knowledge. Therefore, all users can set up their nodes in little time and effort. Learn more about the technological marvel behind OMNIA by following our Medium or reading our whitepaper.
