A Beginner’s Guide
Blockchain technology is what powers the cryptocurrency Bitcoin (BTC) and IOTA is the newest cryptocurrency that is competing with BTC. So how they are related and what makes them distinct from each other, you will get know in this blog.
Bitcoin or BTC is the most commonly known cryptocurrency which uses the blockchain technology, whereas IOTA is another cryptocurrency but unlike BTC, it uses Tangle technology.
So it’s either Bitcoin vs. IOTA or Blockchain vs. Tangle, let’s compare:
1. Transaction Fees
A bitcoin transaction involves a transaction fee of 0.001 BTC. This transaction fee is given to the miner, who ensures that the payer has enough money to make that transaction.
IOTA, on the other hand, make you do the mining removing any additional cost that is supposed to be paid to the miners. You just have to make 2 micro transactions before making your transaction and that’s all. The transaction is FREE.
2. Cryptography
Bitcoin is the king of cryptocurrencies with the market cap of over $111 billion. For hackers, there is lot to gain by stealing just a few Bitcoins.
At present, it is considered to be the most secure way of transacting because of private key cryptography and P2P network. However, it is still exposed to the brute force of Quantum Computers.
Although there is no existence of large scale quantum computers yet, but it is better to be ready with a quantum-resistant cryptography to prevent any future cases of hacking such a huge network.
Unlike other blockchain projects, the Tangle powered IOTA exclusively works on quantum-resistant cryptographic algorithms decreasing the possibility of a Quantum consented brute attack by 1 million times.
3. Micropayments
In the initial days of bitcoin, it was possible to make transactions for a very low fee. This was one of the reasons bitcoin became famous.
With added perks of being decentralized and non-inflationary, bitcoin soon became the cheaper alternative of the existing infrastructure.
But over time, the transaction fees have reached to a point where many bitcoin services have gone impractical making it difficult for the people to deal in bitcoin because of the high transaction fees.
There are no transaction fees for dealing in IOTA. There is also no limit to the minimum transaction amount. You will always be able to exchange as little as 1 IOTA which is worth $1.17 (as on 04–07–2018) without any transaction fee.
4. Adaptation
Among different cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin has the largest market share of more than $111 billion where has a market cap of only $3.27 billion till July 4, 2018.
Also in terms of technology, Tangle is much easier to incorporate with other programming languages as compared to Blockchain.
The companies will need to redraft their entire system to make it Bitcoin supported. With IOTA there is no need to rewrite anything as it can seamlessly be integrated with any coding language be it Java, Python or any other.
Conclusion
At this point, blockchain seems to be better than IOTA with real-world adoption and lack of quantum computers.
But there are huge chances that with the large-scale rapid advancements in the quantum mechanism, AI, robotics etc IOTA may soon overpower the use of blockchain as more and more companies are making collaborations with IOTA.
Ashish Sharma is the Chief Marketing Officer at WeDigTech, a Mobile App Development Company . He is responsible for marketing activities that have to do with creating, communicating and delivering offerings that have value for clients or business partners.