As crypto dominates popular news and continues to infiltrate the Internet, more people are deciding to become well-versed in the world of crypto.
Maybe you’ve heard all the buzz and are trying to see if this crypto-craze lives up to its reputation. Or perhaps you’re a veteran crypto investor looking to brush up on your skills.
Wherever you are in your crypto journey, now’s the time to consider creating your own crypto coin. But how do you do that? And what exactly is a crypto coin, anyway?
Read on to learn how to create a crypto coin!
Table of Contents
What Is a Crypto Coin?
Before you can make your own crypto coin, it’s important to establish what a crypto coin is and what it accomplishes. There are a lot of terms and ideas thrown around when speaking of cryptocurrency, so getting on the same page is paramount to your success in the crypto market.
Think of a crypto coin as a representative of digital money. You can use these coins to make trades on the blockchain of your choosing.
But, where do these elusive coins come from? You can get more coins by purchasing them outright, receiving them for selling digital goods and assets, or by mining them.
Unfortunately, mining and earning coins is not as easy as it used to be. In the past, mathematicians could solve complex problems on the Ethereum blockchain in exchange for receiving coins. Nowadays, there aren’t many Bitcoins left to mine, leaving people to utilize other mining methods like the Proof of Stake (PoS) method.
Regardless, once you have coins, they are your key to conducting business in the crypto world. You can use crypto as a form of investment, as a means to purchase NFTs and other digital assets, or as a way to exchange goods in a peer-to-peer marketplace unhindered by pesky third party participants like the government, merchants, or banks.
All in all, crypto coins are your first stop to launching yourself into the fascinating world of cryptocurrency.
Coins vs. Tokens
You may have heard people throw around the terms coin and token interchangeably. On the contrary, these two pieces have starkly different uses and functions.
A crypto coin operates on its respective blockchain where transactions occur. Etherum, Bitcoin, and any other crypto coin all work on their blockchain. While there are hundreds of blockchains and crypto coins, Ethereum and Bitcoin are probably two of the most well-known.
On the other hand, a token is a part of an existing blockchain. For example, if you want to create your token, you can still use an existing blockchain to conduct your transactions and do not need to create a separate blockchain network.
Another way to think of it is that there can be an infinite amount of tokens for any blockchain, but there can only be one type of crypto coin.
As you might imagine, creating a crypto coin is much more labor-intensive since you must make both the coin and the blockchain network that the coin will operate on.
Another element to consider is that tokens are far more versatile than coins. While coins are limited to digital representations of money, you can use tokens for trading, hold value, represent assets or deeds, and be used as a form of currency.
How to Create a Crypto Coin
Now with the basics out of the way, let’s discuss how to create a crypto coin. Again, when creating your crypto coin, the first thing you have to realize is that you’re creating both the currency and your blockchain.
Doing this takes a substantial amount of time, effort, and money. So, if you’re looking for something a little faster and easier to do, you may want to create a token on an existing blockchain or fork an existing blockchain.
Still, if you want to create your own blockchain from scratch, you can. Plenty of online courses outline step-by-step guides to help you craft your own blockchain and crypto coins. To set yourself up for success, know that you will have to have extensive coding knowledge to keep up with these courses.
If you don’t have the knowledge yourself but still would like to create your coin and blockchain, you can always hire a team of professionals. Keep in mind that this can cost a sizeable amount of money as most coders charge a lot, and the project will undoubtedly require many hours to complete.
As mentioned, the second option is to fork your own blockchain. This is a happy medium that takes much less effort and prior knowledge and is much faster, too.
For this, take an open-source code, alter the code, and then launch a new code with a new name. A great example is Dogecoin or Litecoin, which are off-shoots of Bitcoin. While this process requires some coding knowledge, it’s much more manageable for a beginner coder.
Finally, the last option is to create a token on an existing blockchain as it requires minimal coding information and is easy for anyone to do.
Costs
The costs associated with creating your own crypto coin are a bit hard to narrow down because so many factors go into the development process.
For example, creating a crypto coin by itself doesn’t cost that much, but making your unique blockchain does. Really what costs so much is time, effort, and finding the right people to help complete the task.
Generally speaking, creating a crypto blockchain requires a sophisticated knowledge of coding. If you do not have this knowledge yourself, you will have to hire a team of professional coders to assist in the process.
Because it takes a long time to develop a blockchain, the development process alone can cost several thousand dollars.
General estimates put the costs anywhere between $2000 and $5000. Again, this is only an estimate, and some companies easily exceed $5000 when creating sophisticated cryptocurrencies.
Benefits of Creating Crypto Coins
Now, this certainly seems like a hefty amount of work to create your own digital currency. You might be wondering, why would someone go through this work when they could purchase coins of existing currency, like Bitcoin, or any of the other hundreds of cryptocurrencies floating through the ether?
There are some significant benefits to creating your own cryptocurrency. Perhaps the biggest benefit is the ability to eliminate fraud risk.
From a business standpoint, conducting business and transactions on a blockchain is a much more secure method of doing business. While joining an existing blockchain can come with security issues (since the Ethereum blockchain is technically public), you can better control your security with your own crypto.
If you are a business owner, creating your crypto coin will help set your business above your competition. It also adds immense brand value since you add a bit more weight to your brand. Having your own digital currency also enhances the trust of your customers in your industry, especially if you have a technical or coding business/
In addition to enhancing transactional security, using crypto for your business can save significant money. For example, you can save on taxes and transaction fees for international transactions. And, since all of the exchange happens on the blockchain, you don’t need to spend additional funds recording and tracking transactions.
Drawbacks of a Crypto Coins
Like with any facet of cryptocurrency, there are some drawbacks to using this platform. For one thing, all transactions are final, which means you cannot get a return back (unless the buyer decides to give the money back).
Not only are there thieves and hackers, but this means that if you mistakenly enter an incorrect cryptocurrency address, you cannot reverse the transaction. You may send a request for a refund, but the recipient can deny your request.
This can be a challenging problem among cryptos in general because oftentimes, you don’t know who the buyer and sellers are due to the anonymous nature of cryptocurrencies.
When you create your own cryptocurrency, this may be less of a problem but still is something to be aware of.
Additionally, you’ll need to figure out a way to store your crypto. You’ll need to make sure that you do not lose your keys (or hand out your keys) as once you lose them, you are unable to access your money.
Final Thoughts
Now you know how to create a crypto coin! If you are planning to dive into the world of crypto and create your own coin and blockchain, now is the time to do so.
With so much buzz surrounding the cryptocurrency world, creating your personal crypto coin can put your business leagues ahead of your competitors. It can also help facilitate a more secure and cost-effective business platform.
If you don’t have the coding knowledge to undertake this job yourself, consider hiring a team of developers and coders. While this can undoubtedly cost a lot of money, creating a crypto coin comes with many perks.
Lastly, if the prospect of creating your own coin proves to be too daunting, you can also modify an existing blockchain or, better yet, create a token on a popular blockchain like Ethereum.