How many people own Bitcoin? Well, this might seem like a lazy question to many, but it is a major concern for cryptocurrency investors and enthusiasts.
You will, however, be disappointed when looking for answers since it is difficult to find a reasonably accurate explanation about how many people use Bitcoin.
Luckily, this article analyzes enough data that will ultimately help you make an educated guess.
Determining the Number of Bitcoin Users: Why It Is a Challenge?
The best way to determine how many people own 1 Bitcoin is to analyze the amount held in various addresses. However, there are a few issues associated with this method:
Wallets can hold BTC in one address that belongs to many people
Most exchanges hold thousands of Bitcoins in one address. Treating one address as a person could, therefore, mean that the number of Bitcoin owners is very minimal.
Most BTC users don’t move their assets from an exchange
A majority of Bitcoin users utilize centralized services and do not create Bitcoin wallets.
One person can have many wallets and addresses
Another issue that makes it difficult to determine how many people have invested in cryptocurrency is that many investors have multiple addresses and wallets.
For instance, you could be having 10 BTC in your Tezro mobile wallet and 1 BTC in your Tezro PC wallet or any other wallet. If we treat every wallet or address as a person, we could get inaccurate statistics of cryptocurrency users.
Another way that can be used to estimate the number of BTC owners is to check the number of accounts in exchanges.
Learn all the features of Tezro wallet app here.
This method has its downsides, too that include:
A user can have multiple accounts
Exchanges don’t limit people on the number of accounts they can have. Therefore, we cannot rely on the number of accounts in exchange to find out how many people own cryptocurrency.
Exchanges can be used for other coins
Our interest is to find out how many people own Bitcoin, right? If we rely on the number of accounts in exchanges, we will be ignoring that there are people within an exchange who trades in other coins and not Bitcoin.
There are many inactive accounts
There are people who open accounts in exchanges so that they can buy Bitcoin and wait for the prices to go up. The exchange data still record these accounts even though they don’t own any crypto.
What Does “Using” Really Mean?
Before finding Bitcoin usage statistics, it is important to look for the broadest definition of “using.”
Basically, those who hold Bitcoins in exchanges, whether actively spending them or not, are considered to be “using” Bitcoin and are often included in the Bitcoin users’ graph.
How Widely Used Is Bitcoin?
To understand how many Bitcoin users are in the world, look at these current stats:
- There are over 100 million Bitcoin wallets with value in the current market.
- The number of wallets holding over 100 Bitcoins reached a record 16,000 in October 2020
- The adoption of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency apps in emerging markets reached an all-time high by the end of 2020.
- The number of active daily Bitcoin wallets have hit an average of 1 million.
- About 11% of Americans currently own Bitcoin. This means there are over 30 million Bitcoin users in the US alone.
- About 5% of Europeans own Bitcoins. Therefore, there are over 37 million crypto users in Europe.
It is evident that Bitcoin is once again generating attention, especially now that the world has wallowed in an economic crisis thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. The two biggest wallet providers,
Blockchain.com and Coinbase, have over 59 million wallets and 39 million users, respectively, and it can be assumed that there is a significant Bitcoin user growth, considering that there are hundreds of other BTC wallets out there.
Considering there are 30 million BTC users in America and 37 million in Europe, we can confidently say there are over 67 million BTC users in these two regions alone.
Though, here is a twist – there are only 20 5 million BTC addresses that hold more than $1 worth of Bitcoin. Therefore, finding the number of Bitcoin owners really depends on how we approach the whole notion of “owning.”
If owning means having at least $1 worth of Bitcoin in an address, then there are over 20.5 million cryptocurrency users in the world.
What Percentage of the World Own Bitcoin?
A recent study suggests that there are 25 million crypto traders outside Europe and the USA.
Therefore, there could be over 100 million cryptocurrency users in the world. This means that about 1.3% of the world’s population use BTC.
How Many Daily Users of Bitcoin?
According to Statista, the number of BTC processed daily reached its highest value in January 2021 as many people showed interest in this cryptocurrency. The number shot from 330,000 transactions in December 2020 to 400,000 transactions in early January.
This is significantly higher than the transaction activity of similar cryptocurrencies during the same time. However, this number is significantly lower than its main rival Ethereum, which is currently being processed over 1.1 million times a day.
According to data from Glassnode and Bitinfo, the number of individuals transacting in Bitcoin daily increased in 2020. It has risen from a daily average of 600,000-700,000 users to about 1 million users per day.
In a contradictory statement, however, Kevin Rooke said that only 69 days in BTC history saw over 1,000,000 active addresses on the network.
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How Many Bitcoin Wallets Are There?
As mentioned earlier, most people buy Bitcoins and hold them so that they can sell them later.
These people are also considered cryptocurrency users since they use BTC for saving. To get the actual Bitcoin usage statistics, we, therefore, need to look at the number of Bitcoins in wallets.
What Is A Bitcoin Wallet?
A Bitcoin wallet is an equivalent of a bank account. It allows BTC users to receive Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, store them, and send them to others.
A wallet is basically your personal interface to the BTC network, similar to how an online bank account is an interface to the typical monetary system.
Bitcoin wallets contain secret codes known as private keys that allow users to spend their coins. When you get a private key from a trusted wallet such as Tezro, you need to safeguard it since losing it could mean losing all your assets!
Read more here about Bitcoin Wallets.
So, How Many BTC Wallets Are There?
The answer to this question can help us determine how many cryptocurrency users are there on the globe. The only problem is, we will never tell the actual number of BTC wallets.
Popular wallet providers Coinbase and Blockchain.com claim to have 35 million and 59 million wallets, respectively. This means that together, they have 94 million wallets.
There are hundreds of other wallets, which means there are currently over 200 million or even billions of wallets on the market.
How Many People Have Heard About Bitcoin?
If you are asking how many people own Bitcoin, you also probably want to know how many people have heard about Bitcoin.
Here are the statistics:
- 93% of Brits and 88% of Japanese have heard about Bitcoin. 98% of Americans have also heard about this cryptocurrency.
- 66% of Europeans have heard of this crypto, with 79% in Austria and 78% in Poland.
- 40% of the Chinese population is interested in investing in Bitcoin.
- There are millions of people in developing economies who have heard about Bitcoin and are interested in investing in it.
These figures show that over 2 billion people have heard about Bitcoin. This explains why the number of crypto users keeps rising every day.
How many people own Bitcoins in Emerging Markets?
Studies have shown increased adoption of Bitcoin in Emerging Markets. Some of the countries with many BTC owners include Nigeria, Peru, Spain, China, South Africa, and Turkey. This clearly shows that bitcoin is a global phenomenon.
Even before the economic woes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, some countries such as Venezuela latched on to BTC as a store of value amidst a hyperinflation crisis, and this proves Bitcoin’s real-world tangibility.
Thanks to the ubiquity of wireless networks and smartphone technology, people wrestling with economic collapse or lacking in banking infrastructure are starting to use BTC as an alternative.
How Many People Will Be Using Bitcoin in the Next Five Years?
Now that we have analyzed available data and determined how many people own Bitcoin, you are probably wondering: how many people will be using Bitcoin in the next five years?
Well, before answering this question, let us look at the current number of Bitcoin traders.
According to estimates by a report by CH & Co, there are about 51.2-52.4 million crypto traders in the world. Here is a breakdown of these traders by country:
- Australia and New Zealand: 400,000 traders
- Africa: 1.6 million
- Latin America: 10.5 million
- Japan: 6.75 million
- Asia (Excluding Japan and Korea): 15.3 million
- North America: 15.3 million
- Europe: 10 million
- South Korea: 5 million
According to these figures, there is no doubt that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are going mainstream. They are enjoying wide adoption worldwide, and this means they are the future.
The question of how many people will be using Bitcoin over the next five years is hard to answer. This is because when you pose this question, the answers you get will depend on the age group you are targeting. The older generation is pessimistic and doesn’t believe in the future of Bitcoin.
On the other hand, the younger generation (especially those aged 18-34) are optimistic that cryptocurrency is the solution to all problems in the current financial market.
Nonetheless, with Bitcoin hitting its all-time high of $30,000 amidst a global pandemic, all age groups seem to agree that cryptos are indeed assets that cannot be overlooked.
Find out more here: What will be the future of Bitcoin?
Why Will More People Use Bitcoin In The Next Five Years?
There are many reasons why more and more people will adopt Bitcoin in the next few years. Read more about the history of cryptocurrency and find out why it’s becoming so popular.
Incredible ROI (Return Over Investment)
For the time Bitcoin has been around, it has proven to be among the most lucrative investment options.
Compared to stocks whose highest returns in the US average at around 20%, returns from cryptocurrency can go above 100%.
Despite being a high-risk investment, its incredible ROI is one of the reasons why most people are likely to join the crypto bandwagon in the next five years.
High Volatility
Bitcoin is highly volatile. Even though this is not a good thing – considering there is a possibility of a massive value drop, shrewd investors can use this to their advantage for huge profits.
In the world of crypto trading, strategy matters!
Nonetheless, the good news is that Bitcoin is actually becoming more stable in recent years, even acquiring more stability than U.S. stocks.
Free From Government Interference
One thing that makes Bitcoin different from fiat currency is that it is not controlled by governments or other central authorities.
This independence has prompted many people to invest in crypto, and this trend is expected to continue over the next few years.
Bitcoin’s decentralization gives everyone, including those whose currencies have depreciated due to international sanctions and other factors, to invest and have full control over their investments.
Diminishing Appeal of Other Investment Options
Another reason why more and more people will use Bitcoin over the next few years is the reduction of appealing investment options for retail investors and traders.
Bitcoin is considered a potential effective hedge against inflation. This, combined with its higher reward potential, makes it an amazing and highly profitable investment.
High Liquidity
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are characterized by high liquidity. The fact that it is easy to buy and sell Bitcoin attracts and will continue to attract millions of people across timelines.
Some trading organizations have an auto-trading option that allows investors to make money as they sleep or do other things that matter. This makes Bitcoin even more appealing!
Key Takeaways
- Finding out the actual number of Bitcoin users is difficult because one can have multiple wallets and exchanges, and one wallet can hold an address with coins from many people.
- About 1.3% of the world’s population use Bitcoins.
- There are millions, or even billions, of cryptocurrency wallets on the market today. Therefore, do your due diligence before choosing one to avoid falling prey to scams.
Conclusion
How many people own Bitcoin? Well, since you have read this article to the end, you certainly have the ultimate answer!
Bitcoin has appealed to millions of people across the world since it has proven to be a profitable investment option for years.
Nonetheless, before you choose to invest in this cryptocurrency, you need to know that it is highly volatile and unpredictable.
Make sure you research and come up with investment strategies that will enhance your profits.
Also, remember to store your coins in secure wallets and only trade in reputable exchanges such as Tezro. Download Tezro app and start exchanging Bitcoin safely!
