People commonly call Ethereum a digital currency just like Bitcoin. But it’s more than that. The uses of Ethereum set it far apart from Bitcoin.
Apart from being a currency, it is a platform where you can build decentralised apps. The currency known as Ether or ‘Ethereum’ powers this platform.
Ethereum was co-founded by Vitalik Buterin, Mihai Alsie, Di lorio and Charles Hoskinson in 2014 when it was announced for the first time at a Bitcointalk forum.
Seeing as Ethereum is different from Bitcoin, it has its own specific uses cases. While it shares some of these uses with Bitcoin as well, it has a couple of distinct use cases.
In this post, we’ll take a look at the uses of Ethereum, the second largest cryptocurrency .
The Main Uses of Ethereum
1. You Can Use it to Carry out Financial Transactions
You can use Ethereum to pay for stuff just like you’d use regular currencies like the dollar. Like Bitcoin, there are merchants that accept the Ethereum currency for transactions.
In a recent post published by Coin Sutra, they collated a list of merchants that accept Ethereum for transactions. Some of these merchants are Overstock, Snel, Peddler, 1000 EcoFarms and Laptop Power Bank.
2. You Can Build Apps With It
You can build and run an app on the ethereum system. Using smart contracts and its programming language (solidity), you can program your app to work like a regular app. You’ll be able to can use ETH as a currency to run your payment operations and host your app. This is one of the more common uses of Ethereum.
By building on Ethereum, you can avoid downtime, censorship, fraud or third-party interference.
Some popular Ethereum apps are Compound Finance, Marble, ixLedger, Veil, Open Sea, Origin, and a host of others
If you are interested in this, you can find out more about it on the Ethereum Blockchain App Platform.
3. You can Create Your Own Digital Currencies with Ethereum
The Ethereum blockchain can be used to build other things including digital currencies. So if you have an app and want to run it with your currency, you can create a currency according to the Ethereum standard
Some digital currencies built on the Ethereum blockchain include USD Coin (USDC), Maker (MKR), True USD (TUSD) and Holo. Building a digital currency on the ETH blockchain can reduce the time it takes since you don’t have to start from scratch.
4. You Can Become a Video Game Lord And Make Money Doing It
If you’re a video game fan, then you are in luck with this one! You can make digital items for video games with Ethereum. These items include skins, game pack, ammunition, characters, treasure objects, game collectibles and so on. You can sell them on the open sea marketplace to people who need them in various decentralised games.
Popular Ethereum based games are World of Ether, MegaCryptoPolis, Lordless, Chibi Fighters, ETH.Town.
