Bitcoin Cash

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) is a decentralized cryptocurrency that operates on a peer-to-peer electronic cash system. It was "forked" from Bitcoin (BTC), the world's largest cryptocurrency, in 2017 due to a division over the protocol's future. A fork happens whenever a community makes a change to the blockchain's protocol or basic set of rules, which results in a new blockchain. In the case of Bitcoin Cash, the community set out to create a cryptocurrency that's better suited than Bitcoin for cheap, every day payments. Bitcoin itself, despite originally being named "Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash" in its whitepaper published in 2009, may not be well-suited for use as cash in everyday purchases due to its fees. Bitcoin Cash aims to scale to accommodate global payment system demands, with a block size of 32MB as of 2023, compared to Bitcoin's 1MB block size.

Bitcoin Cash operates on a Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism, similar to Bitcoin. Miners solve complex computational puzzles to validate transactions and create new blocks. The larger block size of Bitcoin Cash allows for faster transaction processing. Bitcoin Cash also supports smart contracts and ecosystem apps. With a capped total supply of 21 million coins and a circulated supply of 19.56M tokens in November 2023, Bitcoin Cash has a limited supply and aims to facilitate easy transactions, with transactions typically costing less than a tenth of a cent.

Bitcoin Cash has a variety of potential use cases. It can be used for peer-to-peer payments between individuals and to pay participating merchants for goods and services both in-store and online. Its structure may support micro-transaction economies, such as tipping content creators and rewarding app users a few cents. Bitcoin Cash also seeks to streamline remittances and cross-border trade. Other potential use cases include tokens, simplified smart contracts, and private payments with tools such as CashShuffle and CashFusion.

Bitcoin Cash was created in 2017 as an alternative to Bitcoin. The creation was a result of a disagreement within the Bitcoin community over scaling issues and the SegWit upgrade. A faction within the community proposed a hard fork to increase the block size limit, which led to the creation of Bitcoin Cash. The reason that Bitcoin Cash's technology was rejected by many Bitcoin developers and users is that a larger blockchain (that can support a greater number of transactions and thus cheaper transactions) comes with a key trade-off. A larger blockchain is harder to validate and store on thousands of computers around the world, which is the foundation of Bitcoin's decentralized nature (such as ensuring that no individual, company, or organization can tamper with Bitcoin's blockchain at its core). Since its inception, Bitcoin Cash has faced its own set of challenges and milestones, including a hard fork in November 2018 that led to the creation of Bitcoin SV (BSV), a separate cryptocurrency.

One way to use Bitcoin Cash is to find a merchant that accepts purchases via Coinbase Commerce. Coinbase Commerce enables merchants to accept Bitcoin Cash transactions easily.

Bitcoin Cash is available via many crypto exchanges and finance apps, including Coinbase.