What is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is digital money that anyone can use, anywhere in the world, without needing a bank or payment company. Instead of accounts controlled by institutions, bitcoin lets people hold and send value directly, using software they control.

Bitcoin is unique because it is three things at once:

• A form of money — scarce, digital, and globally transferable.
• A payment network — running 24/7, with no intermediaries and no closing hours.
• A public ledger (the blockchain) — recording every transaction transparently, for anyone to verify.

Why do we need it?

For all of modern history, money has depended on governments and financial institutions. Those systems work well for many people — but they also bring delays, fees, censorship, inflation, and leave billions with little or no access to banking. Bitcoin offers an alternative that is:

• Censorship-resistant — no one can block a valid transaction.
• Open to everyone — all you need is a phone or computer.
• Predictable in supply — only 21 million bitcoins will ever exist.
• Global — it works the same everywhere, around the clock.

None of these properties came from nowhere — they answer problems money has wrestled with for thousands of years. For that backstory, see our visual history of money.

How does bitcoin do this?

Bitcoin replaces trusted institutions with three interlocking pieces of technology: a peer-to-peer network in place of a central server, cryptography in place of account passwords and fraud departments, and the blockchain — maintained by miners — in place of a bank's ledger. Drill into each concept below.

Getting started

Ready to try it? You'll need two things: a wallet to hold your keys, and a way to get bitcoin — usually an exchange, or simply accepting it as payment. Start small, and read our storage guide before moving meaningful amounts.