Dummy’s Guide To Altcoins

What Is An Altcoin?

You’ve likely heard of Bitcoin but have you heard of an altcoin? Bitcoin was the original cryptocurrency and all other cryptocurrencies that followed were meant to either replace Bitcoin or at least improve upon its use. The term comes from the words “alternative” and “coin” and refers to a Bitcoin alternative, which is essentially every cryptocurrency except for Bitcoin. There are almost 2,000 altcoins that exist today.

How Do Altcoins Differ From Bitcoin?

Bitcoin’s framework is open source, meaning it’s public and accessible to everyone for use. Many altcoins, especially the first altcoins, use the same framework as Bitcoin. This framework is peer-to-peer, uses computing power to solve algorithms to “mine” or unlock new coins, and is a cheaper and more efficient alternative to using traditional fiat currency to complete payment transactions.

Although they use the same framework, they often differ in protocol from Bitcoin. These…