Blockchair is perhaps one of the best blockchain explorer services on the market. Blockchair also likely supports the most blockchain explorers of any on this list with the following blockchains being supported:
Bitcoin
Ethereum
Ripple
Bitcoin Cash
Litecoin
Bitcoin SV
Dash
Dogecoin
Groestlcon
Telegram Open Network (TON)
Etherscan
Etherscan is a fantastic blockchain explorer specific to the Ethereum blockchain and a great alternative to Blockr.io. The UI is very clean and easy to understand. Etherscan is the best blockchain explorer for Ethereum.
BlockExplorer
Another blockchain explorer similar to Blockr.io is BlockExplorer. The interface for BlockExplorer is basic but easy to use making it a top Bitcoin wallet explorer.
BlockCypher
BlockCypher is another top alternative to Blockr.io. It is also one of the few blockchain explorers that support GRIN.
Other blockchains Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dash, Litecoin, Dogecoin, & BlockCypher Testnet.
When it comes to tracking your cryptocurrency portfolio and trades you should check out CoinStats. CoinStats is one of the most highly rated cryptocurrency portfolio tracking apps in the Apple App Store and is available for iOS, Android, Web, Desktop, and Apple Watch.
Cryptocurrency traders often have difficulty deciphering the Kraken vs Coinbase question. Both Kraken and Coinbase are both massively popular cryptocurrency exchanges. The pair both make it extremely easy to buy and sell cryptocurrencies online but vary greatly in terms of coins supported, ease of use, fee structure, and more.
Let this guide serve as a helpful resource to evaluate the pros and cons of Kraken vs Coinbase.
Kraken vs Coinbase: Listed Assets
When searching for a place to buy and sell cryptocurrencies it’s important to understand exactly which currencies each platform will allow you to trade.
Coinbase currently supports only 9 currencies.
Currencies available for purchase on Coinbase’s mobile app
The coins currently available on Coinbase include:
Bitcoin
Ethereum
XRP
Bitcoin Cash
Litecoin
Stellar Lumens
Chainlink
Ethereum Classic
DAI
Kraken supports significantly more coins than Coinbase (31 to be exact).
The full list of available coins can be found below. Whether the coin is available for purchase with fiat will depend on your country’s home currency.
Augur
Basic Attention Token
Bitcoin
Bitcoin Cash
Cardano
Chainlink
Cosmos
Dash
Dai
Dogecoin
EOS
Ethereum
Ethereum Classic
Gnosis
ICON
Lisk
Litecoin
Watermelon
Monero
Nano
OmiseGO
PAX Gold
QTUM
Ripple
Siacoin
Stellar Lumens
Tether (Omni Layer)
Tezos
USD Coin
Waves
Zcash
In short, if you want to be able to trade a wide range of coins, Kraken is the better exchange for you.
Kraken vs Coinbase: Fees
Before you start buying and selling crypto on an exchange it’s important to understand what you will be paying for the service. Exchange fees can be broken down into three main categories:
Deposit fees
Withdrawal fees
Trading fees
Deposit fees
Deposit fees are what you will pay to get your assets into the exchange.
Fortunately, neither Coinbase nor Kraken charge anything to deposit funds.
Withdrawal fees
Withdrawal fees vary greatly between Kraken vs Coinbase.
Kraken‘s withdrawal fees differ based on the cryptocurrency being withdrawn. For a full list of Kraken’s withdrawal fees by cryptocurrency few their withdrawal fee schedule.
Coinbase doesn’t charge a direct withdrawal fee but you will pay a network fee for the transaction.
Buy/Sell fees
Kraken’s buy/sell fees depend on your 30-day trading volume. The more you’ve traded in the past 30-days, the lower your fees will be.
In summary, Kraken’s fee schedule is a bit more reasonable than Coinbase.
Kraken vs Coinbase: User Experience
Interface simplicity
Cryptocurrency exchanges and famously struggled to balance trading capability with user experience simplicity.
Coinbase is a significantly simpler and more easy-to-navigate platform. That said, simplicity often comes with a limitation in capabilities.
Kraken‘s platform is much more complex looking than Coinbase. While this allows for a lot more features, it can be a bit overwhelming to cryptocurrency newbies.
Customer support
Coinbase offers customer support via email and phone to deal with account issues and other support inquiries. However, when it comes to customer support, Coinbase has historically flopped.
Kraken, on the other hand, appears to consistently offer relatively good support for its clients. A common complaint, however, is verification times.
Kraken vs Coinbase: Summary
The Kraken vs Coinbase question is a tough one to answer as both are great options for buying and selling cryptocurrencies. However, they are both intended for digital asset investors of different experience levels. While Coinbase has a simpler interface that beginners will find very user-friendly, it is more limited in terms of capabilities than Kraken.
Who should use Coinbase:
You are an absolute beginner looking for an easy solution to buy and sell digital currencies.
Who should use Kraken:
You are somewhat experienced in cryptocurrency investing and would like a well-regulated and well-established digital asset exchange with added functionality.
Regardless of whether you choose Kraken or Coinbase, you are then going to need an app to track the performance of your portfolios. Fortunately, CoinStats, one of the most highly-rated cryptocurrency portfolio tracking apps in the App Store allows you to sync transactions from both Coinbase and Kraken. The app is available for iOS, Android, Web, Apple Watch, and Desktop.
Jaxx and Exodus are currently two of the most popular cryptocurrency wallet apps. They both offer users a secure and convenient place to store cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum. However, there are many differences between the two services that can make the decision regarding which to use a tough one. Here we’ve broken down some key features and the differences between Jaxx vs Exodus.
Functionality
If you are looking for the core functionality of a crypto wallet, both Jaxx and Exodus should satisfy your needs. They both offer very easy to use crypto storage solutions that are highly secure.
However, if you are looking for functionality beyond this Exodus might frustrate you. Exodus sets itself apart from the crowd by being incredibly simple and, with this simplicity, comes a reduction to functionality.
Exodus’s functionality is primarily limited to asset storage, and exchange. In addition to these functions, Jaxx offers crypto industry news, overall market data, a block explorer, and a rewards program.
Screenshot of Jaxx’s Mobile Wallet
Design
In the design and aesthetic battle of Jaxx vs Exodus, Exodus is the clear winner.
Jaxx delivers great functionality but the UI leaves much to be desired and appears a bit outdated. Exodus, however, has one of the cleanest designs of all cryptocurrency desktop and mobile apps.
Security
It’s important to pay close attention to security when storing your crypto through any third party application. In an industry previously plagued by scams, security should be at the top of your list when evaluating storage options.
Fortunately, Exodus and Jaxx both offer high levels of security for your digital assets. Both services store your private keys directly onto your mobile phone, eliminating the need to trust the companies with your sensitive information.
Another feature both apps offer is hierarchical deterministic. This means the wallets can automatically generate new wallet addresses for each transaction, allowing for better transaction privacy.
At this time, neither Jaxx nor Exodus offer 2-factor authentication.
Wrap up
In conclusion, both Jaxx and Exodus offer fantastic cryptocurrency storage and tracking solutions but there is no clear “better” option between them. Users will find different apps better or worse for their individual needs based on their functionality, design, and security.
CoinStats is another top-tier cryptocurrency application for cryptocurrency price and portfolio tracking and is available for web, desktop, iOS, Android, & Apple Watch.
There are countless cryptocurrencies (over 1000 in fact). While most early investors will gear their attention towards the market leader, Bitcoin, attention is quickly shifted to other high market cap coins like Ethereum and Litecoin.
In this guide, we’ve broken down how these two coins stack up against each other when it comes to important factors like use cases, network fees, transaction speed, third-party support, and more.
A Brief History of Litecoin and Ethereum
Ethereum
Ethereum got its start when blockchain programmer Vitalik Buterin first released its white paper in November of 2013. Buterin, who worked at Bitcoin Magazine at the time, initially proposed the idea behind Ethereum as a way of building decentralized applications, arguing that Bitcoin needed a scripting language for app design. After it failed to integrate with Bitcoin, Ethereum was proposed as an entirely new platform (which it soon became).
Litecoin
On the other hand, Litecoin was created by Charlie Lee in 2011 as a global payment network. Litecoin is sometimes referred to as “digital silver” while Bitcoin is considered “digital gold”. In 2017, Litecoin became the first coin to use segregated witness (more about segregated witness or “seg wit” can be found here). Litecoin adopted the off-chain scaling solution “lightning” that same year.
Use Cases
Ethereum and Litecoin are two of the largest cryptocurrencies in the world by market cap. As of the time of publication, Litecoin has a market cap of 2.7B while Ethereum holds a market cap of 14.7B.
However, despite maintaining top-crypto status, the two cryptocurrencies have been developed for entirely different uses.
Ethereum
Ethereum was created as an open-source project for the design of smart contracts as well as cryptocurrency trade without reliance on a third-party. Ethereum offers several methods of exchange: Ethereum cryptocurrency trade, smart contract deployment, and the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
Smart contracts can be thought of as a code-enforced version of a legal-binding contract from the non-digital world. The EVM is a walled sandbox that serves as an isolated environment in which smart contracts are deployed away from a network, file system, and other processes in a traditional virtual machine.
Smart contracts are often thought of as a system of ensuring an outcome via code.
Imagine the possibilities of having a computer enforce the next time that a relative asks to borrow $50. You might actually get it back. Click here to learn more about smart contract deployment and the EVM.
Litecoin
While Ethereum is marketed as a tool for smart contracts in addition to a tool for cryptocurrency trade, Litecoin is more exclusively marketed as an open-source, peer-to-peer (P2P) digital currency. Thus, Litecoin’s use cases are more one-dimensional compared to Ethereum.
In the value proposition on Litecoin’s website, Litecoin explains itself as a “proven medium of commerce complementary to Bitcoin.”
Simply put, Litecoin is digital money and that’s it.
Network Fees
Ethereum and Litecoin both use the PoW algorithm. While we won’t get too technical regarding what that means you should know that it means a network fee must be paid to send transactions.
Ethereum Network Fees
Like other vehicles, the Ethereum ecosystem requires “gas” to run. Not natural gas like cars, rather, gas is the amount of Ether required to execute a transaction on the network. When someone talks about gas on the Ethereum network, they are usually speaking about either the gas limit or the price of gas.
The gas limit can be thought of as the total amount that you’re willing to spend for a transaction to take place.
Ethereum gas transaction fees are measured in a unit called GWEI, and 1 GWEI is equivalent to 1 billionth Ether. The network fee amount is a function of how busy the network is. If a lot of people are sending Ethereum, the price to send it goes up and vice versa.
Litecoin Network Fees
The Litecoin network’s fee structure is very different than that of Ethereum. When the Litecoin Foundation released Litecoin Core v0.17.1 in 2019, Litecoin lowered its fee from 0.001 LTC/kb to 0.0001 LTC/kb.
What is kb? The unit is a reference to the amount of blockspace your transaction will take if it gets recorded. That means your fee is not dependent on the amount of Litecoin you’re sending, instead, it’s determined by how much space your transaction is taking.
While the calculations required to determine Ethereum’s fees vs that of Litecoin can seem complex, in general, Litecoin’s fees are less expensive than that of Ethereum.
Winner: Litecoin (usually)
Transaction Speed
The speed of a transaction on the Ethereum blockchain is determined by the amount of gas that is spent on a transaction. As you will see from the screenshot below, the amount of gas you’re willing to pay will determine how quickly your transaction goes through.
According to ETHGasStation.info, a typical Ethereum transaction (on an average day) takes between 15 seconds and 5 minutes to process using the standard gas price.
On the other hand, Litecoin has an average transaction speed of 30 minutes with a maximum capacity of 56 transactions per second.
Winner: Ethereum
Third-Party Support
Cryptocurrencies become more accepted every year and there are already some huge companies accepting the digital assets as form of payment. But which coin has more support from outside parties?
Ethereum
When it comes to third-party support, Ethereum is the clear winner.
Ethereum is one of the most widely accepted cryptocurrencies on the planet. Services like Metamask make transacting in Ether online really easy and nearly every major cryptocurrency app or exchange supports Ethereum.
When Samsung first announced it’s blockchain wallet app Ethereum was listed before both Litecoin and Bitcoin.
Ethereum is also the most widely developed-on blockchain ever created. Here are some popular projects that have developed on Ethereum’s blockchain:
Additionally, Ethereum has an extensive enterprise community. The Ethereum blockchain is used by some of the most powerful companies in the world, including extensive integration with Fortune 50 companies like Microsoft, IBM, and Amazon.
A long list of companies that accept payments in Ethereum can be found here.
Litecoin
Even though Ethereum wins when it comes to third-party support, there are still a lot of different payment gateways, online retailers, wallets, exchanges, travel websites, and many more establishments that work with Litecoin.
A full list of businesses that support Litecoin payments can be found here.
Winner: Ethereum
In Conclusion
While Litecoin and Ethereum are both massively disruptive and powerful cryptocurrencies, they are very unique when it comes down to factors like fees and third party support.
Ethereum is more complex with a larger purpose within enterprise blockchain and smart contracts while Litecoin has more of a one-dimensional existence as a peer-to-peer digital currency.
On average, Litecoin transactions are less expensive than that of Ethereum but much slower and, when it comes to integration with third-parties Ethereum is the clear winner.
Both cryptocurrencies have undoubtedly played a large role in the history of blockchain and digital payments and iit will be exciting to see the legacy of both unfold in the larger unraveling of the current banking system.
Kraken is an incredibly powerful cryptocurrency exchange and is one of the most popular blockchain platforms in the world. However, Kraken has many competitors and might not be the correct option for every cryptocurrency investor and trader. By following this Kraken review guide, we hope you will be better capable of creating a more informed decision regarding if Kraken is the right exchange for you.
Before we get into the protocol’s core, let’s start with a little bit of history.
Kraken’s History
Founded in 2011, Kraken is a dinosaur when it comes to the cryptocurrency industry. Following the Mt. Gox security breach of 2011, Kraken founder, Jesse Powell appeared at the offices of Mt. Gox. Powell told Bloomberg news that he began working on Kraken as a replacement for Mt. Gox in case the company was to permanently close (which it soon did).
After two years of extensive testing and development, Kraken went live in September 2013 as one of the first exchanges. It initially offered Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Euro trades. Kraken soon grew to allow additional currencies and margin trading.
After Kraken acquired British derivatives company Crypto Facilities for an undisclosed amount in the 9-digit range (yeah, like over $100M), it became the first exchange to offer both spot trading and futures trading.
Tension surrounding the exchange started to build in December 2019 after reports came from a whistleblower that Kraken was allegedly violating US Sanctions as well as committing other illicit acts.
According to Crowdfund Insider, the whistleblower witnessed Kraken do the following:
Serve customers in Sanctioned Regions;
Maintained banking balance sheets that were short million of customer deposits;
Changed the terms of employee stock options without informing employees.
The whistleblower said that complaining about these issues led him to be terminated on the first day of his medical leave in August 2019. More about the whistleblower can be found here.
Security Compared to Other Exchanges
Kraken uses a combination of different storage methods which include off-line and air-gapped, cold storage that is geographically distributed.
The Kraken servers are under secure cages with 24/7 surveillance by armed security guards and video monitors. Additionally, Kraken does penetration testing where they have expert teams testing for system-wide openings that hackers will infiltrate as attack vectors. The exchange also runs a bug bounty program to involve the wider cybersecurity community.
Additionally, Kraken undergoes a “Proof of Reserves” audit process and uses a third party to ensure its funds are being handled properly.
Other security features include:
2FA
Email confirmation
Configurable account timeout
SSL encryption while browsing Kraken
24/7 chat and email support
PGP Encryption
The security features that Kraken uses are typical for cryptocurrency exchanges of its size. More about Kraken’s security protocol can be found on Kraken’s website.
Kraken Security vs Binance
Binance and Kraken both keep 95% of the cryptocurrency offline in cold storage. Kraken outlines the methods that they use for cold storage (e.g., Kraken explicitly states that it uses “air-gapped, geographically distributed storage”) on the website. Binance does not list any such details specifically.
Kraken Security vs Coinbase
According to the Coinbase website, Coinbase keeps 98% of customer digital currency in cold storage with a remainder and secure online servers. Coinbase’s percentage serves as an industry high and tops the percentage of crypto that Kraken reserves in cold storage (95%).
Coinbase and Kraken are similar in that they are two of the only remaining top-tier cryptocurrency exchanges that have not been hacked.
Coins Listed on Kraken
There are 30 different cryptocurrencies listed on Kraken, which include more mainstream coins like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tether, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, and Waves. However, the exchange also caters to cryptocurrencies with smaller market caps.
Kraken’s list of 30 cryptocurrencies is about average for the industry. It is almost double that of the 18 that Coinbase has listed. Compared to the 170 coins that are listed on Binance, Kraken’s crypto count might seem small.
Given the fact that Binance had a major security breach and Coinbase and Kraken have not yet had one, sometimes less is more, as they say.
Fees Compared to Other Exchanges
Kraken uses a maker-take fee schedule with volume incentives based on the last 30 days of your trading activity. On Kraken’s website, the company explains to users that the fee schedule was designed to encourage traders to engage and drive maximum liquidity.
A breakdown of Kraken’s Maker/Taker fees. More info here.
With regards to fee “levels”, Kraken has 9 while Binance has 10. Both exchanges use a similar tiered approach to fees using 30 days trading volume as a factor.
A small difference in methodologies: Kraken calculates the 30-day trading window using USD whereas Binance calculates your fee schedule based on the value of your account in Bitcoin.
Binance’s fees are dramatically lower than Kraken’s however, especially when you use Binance’s native BNB coin.
Read more about Binance’s fee schedule on our other posthere.
Compared to Coinbase, however, both Binance and Kraken have lower fees. The system that CoinBase uses is based on percentage points of the total sale and it implements a conversion system. Coin base fees range from 1.49% to 3.99%.
Shapeshift is the current industry-low with zero commission and zero trading fees if users trade with the FOX token.
Finishing Up
After being one of the first enterprises to enter into the crypto arena, Kraken has had a storied history. It’s been able to deflect major hacks while steadily maintaining a strong user base. For that reason, and the fact that the exchange has not been hacked (despite being older than Coinbase and Binance) it maintains a reliable reputation.
In addition to having a reputation as a secure exchange, Kraken is a cheaper alternative than Coinbase. It also offers more coins than Coinbase does. While Kraken has higher trading fees than Binance, Binance has been hacked, Kraken (and Coinbase) have not.
Overall, Kraken is a great exchange to use and have in your toolkit, especially if it can maintain its status as unhackable.
Another exchange to look into is ShapeShift if you are interested in zero trading fees and 50 different digital assets to trade from. Binance and Coinbase also offer solid options, Coinbase with its solid UI/UX, and Binance because of its number of choices and educational resources.
