Bitcoin vs Ethereum: Understanding the difference through a simple analogy.
Tags: bitcoin, ethereum, blockchain, web3
Published: 2022-06-08 11:32:24

With the recent rise and popularity of web3, you might have heard of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dodgecoin etc etc on your Twitter feed, news or normal day conversations.

Cryptocurrencies are often referred to as digital gold coins or assets. 

Now, depending on when you are reading this post, it could be that you don’t even know what gold is.

So think of gold as this shiny and valuable asset usually in the form of coins. 

And believe it or not, in the real world, people could/can actually go and buy gold coins in exchange for money, or some other valuable goods. 

So now that we know what a gold coin is, Bitcoin is basically the digital version of it for the online world, made possible using cryptographic and blockchain technologies. 

And just like gold, you can actually buy Bitcoin in exchange for money, other cryptocurrencies and valuable goods. 

The logo even looks like a gold coin but has a B in the middle.

![GIF of Bitcoin](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fthumbs.gfycat.com%2FIllSharpCod-max-1mb.gif&f=1&nofb=1)

**So Bitcoin = Digital Gold Coin/Asset.**

Now Ethereum, I like to think of it more as Digital Liquid Gold instead of a Digital Gold Coin.

So instead of getting a standardised solid gold coin, you get liquid gold, which you can then use to create other valuable stuff that is important to you. 

Say you want to turn the liquid gold into a gold watch, so it is valuable but also tells you the time, you can! Or a gold car, so again it is valuable but lets you drive around? You can! 

You could also just turn the digital liquid gold into coins or custom cryptocurrencies, but instead of writing a B in the middle, you either write an E or a D or any other letter on it and call the token whatever you like as the creator. That is exactly what Ethers are: cryptocurrency but for Ethereum. 

This is why Ethereum or liquid digital gold, becomes not just an asset but a utility as well. 

![GIF of Ethereum](https://media.giphy.com/media/Wu4TiWLLFqxk4KMRiU/giphy.gif)

**So Ether, Link, Matic = Digital Gold Coin.**
**And Ethereum, Chainlink, Polygon = Digital Liquid Gold.**

I came up with this analogy from my limited knowledge about the subject. I plan to deep dive into the technical differences between the two as well. If you have another analogy to explain the difference between the two, let me know in the comments below!

Essentially, if you have access to a digital liquid gold like Ethereum, you can make your own applications with it by deploying **smart contracts** (watch out for a future post explaining what smart contracts are) or if you are interested to just go buy cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ether, Link, you would then need a **crypto wallet** like Metamask to store them (will be writing a post about that too).

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Feel free to connect on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/iiqrah/) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/iiqrah_). 

That's all for this post.
K Bye.