If you look at the cryptocurrency markets alone, there is a clear winner. Bitcoin, of course. There’s no doubt about it. The godfather of crypto has the highest price, the largest market share, and the most liquidity. It can be traded against virtually anything and is valuable everywhere. These factors make it the true “boss” of the cryptocurrency market, but what about its competition, specifically Bitcoin Cash? While it might have been written off, left, right, and center, there is one area where Bitcoin Cash might be able to best the behemoth that is BTC.
Wide Open Spaces
Bitcoin is in high demand, which has led to full blocks in the past. Currently, block space is still in short supply, so the average transaction fee is about 63 cents. On Bitcoin Cash, it’s a fraction of a cent. This is Bitcoin Cash’s one true advantage, and while it may not stand the test of time (see the Lightning Network), right now it’s a good reason to try out BCH.
The dream of sending almost-free transactions in a secure network is still alive in Bitcoin Cash. Further, because fees are low and space is plentiful, the blockchain can be used for more purposes. For example, it can be used to make a gambling site that sends dozens or hundreds of transactions per second, back and forth.
Major casinos like BitStarz accept Bitcoin Cash, if that tells you anything. Sites like this require a lot of transactions, and would rack up tons of fees for miners if it still ran solely on Bitcoin. It originally ran on just Bitcoin, but as time has moved on, the one major upside to Bitcoin Cash has become hard to ignore.
For all of that, Bitcoin Cash sees a lot less use than Bitcoin. And while some argue that it’s “better,” cryptocurrency remains a speculator’s market. That means that whatever returns the most value, wins. Buying into Bitcoin Cash now will yield decent returns – the currency has doubled recently. But if you came in at the beginning of BCH, you’re still a long way from the all-time-high prices that followed its inception in 2017.
Lightning Network
Bitcoin, of course, has an answer to more block space. The Lightning Network, a “second-layer” apparatus that runs on top of the Bitcoin blockchain. Transactions are settled “off-chain” with the use of payment channels. The result is far cheaper transactions, instantly settled. The only catch is that you’ll have to use a Lightning-enabled wallet.
But in the meantime, there are other reasons to consider Bitcoin Cash. For one thing, it has a thriving community, complete with monetized blogging sites like memo.cash or Honest.cash/Hymm.io.
Bitcoin.com and Roger Ver continually work to build new products for the Bitcoin Cash space. Ver is a passionate believer in the cryptocurrency, and perhaps its most influential supporter. Once a fervent Bitcoin evangelist, Ver lost his taste for BTC when he came up against what many consider to be “toxic maximalists.”
Indeed, the philosophical arguments that famously led to the Bitcoin Cash fork are legendary. People from both sides made good points, but ultimately a fork was the best solution.
Roger Ver
People have taken issue with Bitcoin.com being a site primarily devoted to Bitcoin Cash, but Roger Ver and other supporters have no issue underlining the difference between BTC and BCH. For the same reason, that cranky Bitcoiners don’t want people getting confused when they buy cryptocurrencies, people who support Bitcoin Cash would want to ensure that their new converts knew what, exactly, they were getting into.
My argument is that Bitcoin Cash is a more enjoyable experience at this point. One simply installs a wallet and sends and receives. It’s fast and basically free to use, and it gains value alongside Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. It may not be as popular as Bitcoin proper, but Bitcoin Cash is one of the most popular cryptocurrencies in the world. It saw about 45,000 transactions over the 24-hour period at time of writing.
So, for me and many others, the choice is clear – Bitcoin Cash. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t also hold Bitcoin – I’m definitely not saying that – but the current native design of BTC is prohibitive for using it in quite the same way that you can on Bitcoin Cash.
In my opinion, while Bitcoin Cash may be more like what we expected Bitcoin to evolve into, Bitcoin is still probably a better bet in terms of investment. That being said, write off Bitcoin Cash at your peril!
