The introduction of cryptocurrencies was one of the largest phenomenons of the 2010s and it saw an alternative way to transfer funds, far removed from traditional banking institutions. Even the eWallets and prepaid cards accepted by gambling websites are somehow tied to the banks, whereas cryptocurrencies exist within their own space undisturbed. This provides a number of benefits to users and online casinos quickly caught on. Cryptos are used at many casino sites as a form of legitimate currency and are happy to take your tokens.
Some have begun to incentivize customers to deposit with Bitcoin or alt-coins, giving better bonuses and removing transaction limits for crypto users. In this article, we will take a look at the top five cryptocurrencies that you can use for the purposes of online gambling.
Bitcoin
The grandfather of all cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin is where it all started back in 2009. It has been 10 years since this crypto came out and it is still the most popular one on the market, despite its age. While the blockchain technology behind Bitcoin has not aged particularly well and many new cryptocurrencies have come out with better solutions, This cryptocurrencies has remained at the top consistently. Its wide-spread acceptance and the trust people place in this coin are what make it work. As it happens, there is no online casino that accepts crypto payments that does not also support Bitcoin. In fact, Bitcoin makes its way in the online poker world also many gambling websites, especially those in the Americas, have started to hold Bitcoin in higher regard than traditional payment methods like credit cards or eWallets.
According to the NYPost opinion on Bitcoin, the oldest cryptocurrencie may be showing its age but it has never been more popular and by the looks of things, it will remain that way for a long time. If you were to bet on which crypto will still be in use after a few years, Bitcoin is a safe wager.
Ethereum
Ethereum is part of the wave of new cryptocurrencies, fully released to the general public in 2015 and developed by Vatalik Buterin and company. This blockchain is significantly faster and more efficient than Bitcoin ever was and this did not go unnoticed by the crypto user base. Ethereum quickly rose in popularity and soon reached the second place in the hierarchy, strictly behind Bitcoin. Unlike Bitcoin, Ethereum was never meant to be used as a store of value, rather as a platform for new blockchain projects. Regardless of its initial intent, people quickly got behind Ethereum and the ETH token soon skyrocketed in value.
Ethereum differs significantly from Bitcoin and other blockchains from that era in the sense that it was created with the idea of scalability and futureproofing. It is still being developed to this day and major improvements have been made to the blockchain over the years. In the realm of online gambling, ETH is an excellent way to manage one’s bankroll. Ethereum transactions are much quicker and new blocks are mined every 7 seconds, allowing for your payment to go through within a minute. While not as widely accepted as Bitcoin, it is the superior transaction method from a technical perspective.
Bitcoin Cash
Bitcoin Cash is where things start to become complicated. Since the original Bitcoin was released in 2009, few changes had been done to the base code which proved troublesome as the blockchain became ever more popular and more and more users were coming on board. Transactions were becoming slower and the future of the platform came under great scrutiny. At this point, Bitcoin had become too large to fail in a sense and there was no chance that people were going to abandon it. This is were Bitcoin Cash came into the picture. A few programmers came together and took the existing base code, implementing needed changes, creating a new blockchain in its own right. The existing ledger of transactions was kept intact and this group of developers split the new blockchain from the original. This meant that at the moment of the split Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin were the same, with users wallets having the identical number of tokens. However, as soon as the first Bitcoin Cash block was mined it developed into its own thing.
After this took place, Bitcoin Cash grew to be in the top 10 cryptocurrencies and it remains there until today. In online gambling, you will often find that Bitcoin Cash enjoys almost the same level of support as the original Bitcoin. Bitcoin Cash transactions are quicker and smoother than Bitcoin ones.
Litecoin
Litecoin is another popular cryptocurrency and one that is older than most. Established in 2011, Litecoin started off as a carbon copy of Bitcoin with changes coming in on a regular basis. Indeed, Litecoin used the original Bitcoin code in the beginning but has since developed into its own unique platform. It includes several advantages over the Bitcoin blockchain in ways that anyone can appreciate. For one, blocks are mined every 2.5 minutes, instead of every 10 minutes as in Bitcoin. This means that transactions are much quicker and your money will be stuck in limbo much shorter. This is the primary advantage of Litecoin over Bitcoin from the user’s perspective.
In online gambling, Litecoin is one of the several most supported currencies out there. While Bitcoin is without a doubt at the top, Litecoin also enjoys recognition by operators. If an online casino accepts multiple forms of cryptocurrency, odds are that Litecoin is one of them.
Dogecoin
Dogecoin is not something one would take seriously, yet it is an interesting cryptocurrency nonetheless. Started off as a joke in late 2013, Dogecoin has risen to become a major cryptocurrency. Featuring the likeness a Shiba Inu dog on its logo, Dogecoin was inspired by an Internet meme and that was meant to be its full potential. Interestingly enough, it caught on with the general public and it soon rose in prominence. While never a serious contender for the top positions, Dogecoin has remained a steady and solid presence in the crypto community.
Where Dogecoin differs from the rest of the cryptos mentioned above is in the value of a single token. While Bitcoin has the potential to reach values of $17,000 or more for a single unit of BTC, Dogecoin is nowhere near that level. In fact, at the time of this writing, it is valued at less than a third of a cent and at its highest point held a value of $0.015. This is due to the sheer number of tokens in circulation, almost 120 billion at the moment of writing. Regardless of anything, Dogecoin is certainly a usable cryptocurrency and there is a decent number of gambling websites that are more than happy to accept deposits in DOGE.