Cryptocurrency is unavoidable in 2025

Reading headlines about crypto regulation, rapid asset price changes or even the latest memecoin may pique your interest in things like Bitcoin mining

Cryptocurrency has become increasingly mainstream in recent years, and 2024 saw a boom in interest in digital assets. From headlines about crypto regulation and rapid asset price changes to the latest memecoin, there’s no shortage of buzz around crypto.

If you’re interested in learning more about crypto, here are some of the most common questions people have:

Who owns the most bitcoin?

Individuals with massive Bitcoin holdings are known as “Bitcoin whales.” Satoshi Nakamoto, the chosen pseudonym of Bitcoin’s creator, is believed to be the biggest whale, holding an estimated 1.09 million coins.

If so, Nakamoto’s net worth would have been about $119 billion — around the net worth of Nvidia CEO and cofounder Jensen Huang — when the price of Bitcoin peaked at more than $109,000 in January. Other Bitcoin whales include Binance with about 633,000 coins, Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) with roughly 500,000 and the U.S. government with about 200,000.

However, spot Bitcoin ETFs now collectively hold about 1.12 million bitcoins, more than any other person, company or government.

How long does it take to mine 1 bitcoin?

It takes an average of 10 minutes to move one single Bitcoin block throughout the entire decentralized blockchain network and earn the reward of 3.125 bitcoins. This is referred to as Bitcoin’s block time. But this doesn’t mean you can mine a new coin before your lunch break ends.

Bitcoin mining takes a ton of processing power and electricity. A computer mines Bitcoin not by digging in the ground, but by validating blockchain transactions through trial and error.

For context on Bitcoin’s energy consumption, recording a transaction on the decentralized ledger consumes about as much power as a U.S. household uses in 45 days, according to Digiconomist. As such, if you wanted to mine Bitcoin at home, it’d take about nine years’ worth of energy.

What are crypto ETFs?

Just like other thematic exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, crypto ETFs let investors add a specific type of asset to their portfolio, such as shares of tech companies that invest in blockchain technology, baskets of several cryptocurrencies or even companies that create crypto-mining tools.

Moreover, crypto ETFs can focus on a single coin, such as the spot Ethereum and Bitcoin ETFs that were approved in 2024. Bitcoin futures ETFs, which don’t own bitcoins directly, have been traded since 2021.

How many satoshis are in 1 bitcoin?

There are 100 million satoshis in one bitcoin. Satoshis are named after the anonymous creator who first introduced Bitcoin. This tiny unit references the fact that one coin can be officially split into 100 million pieces.

A satoshi is the smallest unit of bitcoin and can make smaller transactions easier to understand. If you put $10 into bitcoin, you’d have 0.0011872 of a bitcoin or 11,872 satoshis. A satoshi is just a term. You can buy however much bitcoin you want.

What does a bitcoin look like?

Bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies are intangible, so there isn’t a metal coin equivalent in the same way 25 cents can be physically represented as a silver U.S. quarter. Any photos or physical “bitcoins” you see are just conceptual. Artistic mock coins usually bear this symbol for Bitcoin, ₿.

Is crypto dead?

For minable tokens and Bitcoin, there’s still more to mine. Likewise, current hype trends are in the crypto industry’s favor. Many have predicted or declared crypto’s death over the years, and yet it remains a ubiquitous investment with a high level of interest.

Of course, individual coins fizzle out all the time, but overall cryptocurrency isn't dead. To the contrary, an average of 23,300 new memecoins launched every day in the last year on just Pump.fun, a platform where you can create a coin in a few clicks, according to crypto data-tracker Dune.

How many cryptocurrencies are there?

The exact number of existing cryptocurrencies is hard to nail down. CoinMarketCap is tracking more than 10,640 cryptocurrencies as of mid-March 2025, but this isn’t a comprehensive list.

Tens of thousands of memecoins are created daily, and based on that data, there are millions of cryptocurrencies. The vast majority of tokens are fairly obscure though, but large-cap cryptocurrencies include Bitcoin, Cardano, Ethereum, Solana and Tether.