All those who are following cryptocurrency news would know that bitcoin remains the topmost selling digital currency in the market. It is thought to be the leader amongst other cryptocurrencies in the digital market. Whether it is the market capitalization, overall adoption rates, or other contenders, bitcoin has a lead everywhere. Its growing adaptability and varied applications make it stand out from the crows.
However, many cryptocurrencies have evolved to give tough competition to bitcoin. Ripple ranks fourth on the list of the most popular cryptocurrencies by market cap; bitcoin comes on first, then Ethereum, and then tether on third. Ripple is also known as XRP. Although technically, Ripple is the name of the company and the network operating behind the currency and XRP is the actual digital currency.
To find out the answer to the question of whether ripple (XRP) will be the next bitcoin or not, let’s draw a comparison:
Transaction Validation
Transaction validation is of significant importance to judge the performance of a cryptocurrency. Bitcoin uses the blockchain mining concept for validating transactions whereas the Ripple network uses a consensus mechanism that is a unique distributed mechanism. It works through a network of servers for validating a transaction.
A poll is conducted for the nodes or servers on the respective network to decide by a consensus about the authentication and validation of the transaction. Thus, it results in instant and quick confirmations without involving any central authority. It further implies that XRP is decentralized and more reliable than some of its other competitors.
The mining system of bitcoin is sometimes referred to as the ‘energy hungry’ cryptocurrency but the system of Ripple requires minimal energy/power due to its mining free mechanism.
Processing Times and Costs
There are many platforms like the yuan pay group that provides you with the facility of cryptocurrency trading. However, each currency that you trade has some processing time and cost. Bitcoin transactions are known to take a long time for confirmations and sometimes the cost associated with the transaction may be very high. On the other hand, XRP transactions take much less time and are known to confirm a transaction within seconds. The total supply of bitcoins is 21 million whereas XRP has a total of 100 billion pre-mined digital coins.
Mining and Circulation
Mining is becoming famous with every passing day. To release new BTC, Bitcoin uses a proof-of-work system and mining that forms a vital part of the validation process. When we compare it with XRP, Ripple tokens are already mined. Thus, XRP mining is not the same as compared to bitcoin mining.
Similarly, the cryptocurrency release mechanism is also different for bitcoin and ripple. Bitcoins are released and added to the network when the miners find them. On the other hand, Ripple coins are released by smart contracts.
As stated above, Ripple has planned to release 100 billion coins in total and it is further divided into releasing 1 billion XRP tokens per month. It is governed by the in-built smart contract and the currency circulation of the coins is more than 50 billion.
If there is any unused portion of the ripple coins in a particular month then it will be shifted back to an escrow account. This method has been implemented to make sure that there is no possible misuse of the currency due to an oversupply. Thus, it will take many years for all digital currency coins of Ripple to be available in the market.
Conclusion:
In the end, it can be said that ripple has an upper hand when it comes to processing time and transaction charges. However, it will take time for Ripple to cross the widespread popularity of BTC.
