Bitcoin

Bitcoin is the first decentralized network to support a cryptographically-secure digital asset, using public-key cryptography to record, sign and send transactions. The native token BTC operates on the Bitcoin network, a layer-1 blockchain.

Bitcoin is currently the largest cryptocurrency by market valuation.

Pseudonymous founder Satoshi Nakamoto devised Bitcoin as a decentralized, peer-to-peer network, able to facilitate financial transactions without a central authority like a government or bank. In doing so, Satoshi solved a key issue, the double-spending problem, by creating a proof-of-work consensus mechanism within a blockchain structure. Bitcoin's network was activated in January 2009 when Satoshi mined the first block, or the "genesis block” and 50 BTC entered circulation at a price of $0.00. Fifty bitcoin continued to enter circulation every block (created once every 10 minutes) until the first halving event took place in November 2012. Halvings which are programmed into Bitcoin’s code by Satoshi involve automatically halving the number of new BTC entering circulation every 210,000 blocks.Bitcoin has a fixed supply of 21 million and no more bitcoin can be created and units of bitcoin cannot be destroyed. Each bitcoin is made up of 100 million satoshis (the smallest units of bitcoin), making individual bitcoin divisible up to eight decimal places. That means anyone can purchase a fraction of a bitcoin with as little as one U.S. dollar.

In 2006 development began by an anonymous computer programmer or group of programmers under the pseudonym “Satoshi Nakamoto." Satoshi subsequently published a whitepaper outlining the network’s framework and operation in 2008 titled “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.” In January 2009, the Bitcoin network launched its 0.1 release.

Scalability

The Bitcoin network is a peer-to-peer electronic payment system that uses a bitcoin cryptocurrency to transfer value over the internet or act as a store of value like gold and silver. Everything is done publicly through a transparent, immutable, distributed ledger technology also known as a blockchain without any intermediaries. Holders who store their own bitcoin have complete control over it. It cannot be accessed without the holder’s cryptographic key.

Governance

The Bitcoin blockchain utilizes a proof-of-work (PoW) based consensus mechanism. Every single bitcoin transaction that takes place has to be permanently committed to the Bitcoin blockchain ledger through a process called “mining.” Miners compete using specialized computer equipment known as application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) chips. Hash power is the computational power used to validate network processes such as the difficult math problems which need to be solved to unlock the next block in the chain. In order to incentivize the miners to do so, a fee is attached to each transaction and that fee is awarded to whichever miner adds the transaction to a new block. Miners can form pools in order to win the right to mine the next transaction block. When a group of miners wins, each participant receives a share of the block rewards equivalent to the hash power their miner provided to the mining pool. Fees work on a first-price auction system, where the higher the fee attached to the transaction, the more likely a miner will process that transaction first.

Community

The Bitcoin blockchain and the bitcoin.org website are supported by open-source developers from around the world contributing at will. The Bitcoin Foundation facilitates community activations and events engaging software engineers and Bitcoin enthusiasts to develop and innovate on the Bitcoin platform.