Active Ethereum addresses growing twice as fast as Bitcoin – Decrypt

The number of active Ethereum addresses has more than doubled since the start of 2020. Ethereum's active address count is growing at nearly twice the rate of Bitcoins.

Data from the blockchain analytics website Messari shows that Ethereums active address count has increased by 118% since the turn of the year. Bitcoins active address count, by comparison, increased by 49%.

Why are more people turning to Ethereum than Bitcoin? One obvious answerEthereum is home to the top decentralized finance (DeFi) applications.

The rise of DeFi apps on Ethereum drove the blockchains total number of unique addresses to over 100 million by early June. A July report from Dapp.com estimated that DeFi applications accounted for over 97% of all Dapp volume on Ethereum.

The 100 million figure accounts for every unique address used in a transaction on Ethereumboth senders and recipients. This, obviously, doesnt account for users who use multiple addresses, and so doesnt entirely reflect the growth of Ethereums user base.

However, data from Bitinfocharts tracks transactions that go either from or to unique Ethereum addresses. Seen below, unique active Ethereum addresses rose 160% since January 1, climbing from 208,392, to 542,458 at time of writing.

Meanwhile, Bitcoins unique active address count rose 42% in the same time, climbing from 585,047 on January 1 to 832,751 by July 10. This aligns closely with the data from Messari, and lends credence to the notion that Ethereum is currently experiencing a groundswell of renewed interest and activity.

But while the rise of DeFi has undoubtedly contributed to the rise in unique Ethereum addresses, another Ethereum-based Dapp could also be playing a major role.

As reported by Decrypt on July 5, Forsage, the most popular Dapp on activity by user count, was responsible for guzzling almost 13% of Ethereums gas. Gas is the fuel that runs Ethereum, and is used as a measurement of the price of performing computations on the network.

That means Forsagewhich the Philippines SEC has denounced as an unregistered securityis hogging 13% of the entire Ethereum blockchain. The presence of a Russian Ponzi scheme known as MMM Global has also contributed to the hoarding of Ethereums computational power in recent times. These operations usually see funds transferred from address to address, adding to Ethereums total unique address count.

Today, Forsage accounts for 12.5% of Ethereums gas usage, according to Dune Analytics, while ETH Gas Station places the figure at 15.8%.

Either way, the presence of what Ethereum researcher and developer Philippe Castonguay told Decrypt were inevitable and unstoppable Ponzi schemes should also be considered when accounting for Ethereums increased usage.