In 2018, there was a popular infographic that made rounds on social media that listed the top 100 cryptocurrencies in terms of market cap with short descriptions of each project (click to expand):
The author also wrote lists for the top 200 and 300 cryptocurrencies:
I found these lists to be useful because they provided a bird’s-eye view of the cryptocurrency industry at the time. The lists are a bit outdated now because a lot of new projects have appeared since then while others have fallen out of popularity. As a bit of a homage to the original series, I decided to create an updated list for 2024. Due to time constraints, I have shortened the list to include only the top 50 cryptocurrencies:
Here is the same list as a table:
| Market cap rank | Coin | Ticker | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bitcoin | BTC | First decentralized cryptocurrency. |
| 2 | Ethereum | ETH | Smart contract platform. |
| 3 | Tether | USDT | Stablecoin pegged to USD. |
| 4 | BNB | BNB | Binance exchange utility token. |
| 5 | Solana | SOL | Fast, cheap transactions and DApps. |
| 6 | USDC | USDC | Stablecoin backed by USD. |
| 7 | XRP | XRP | Global money transfer network. |
| 8 | Toncoin | TON | Telegram-linked scalable blockchain. |
| 9 | Dogecoin | DOGE | Fun, meme-inspired cryptocurrency. |
| 10 | Cardano | ADA | Decentralized app platform. |
| 11 | TRON | TRX | Decentralized app platform. |
| 12 | Avalanche | AVAX | Fast, scalable smart contracts. |
| 13 | Shiba Inu | SHIB | Ethereum-based meme token. |
| 14 | Polkadot | DOT | Interoperable multi-blockchain platform. |
| 15 | Chainlink | LINK | Decentralized oracle network. |
| 16 | Bitcoin Cash | BCH | Peer-to-peer electronic cash. |
| 17 | UNUS SED LEO | LEO | Bitfinex exchange utility token. |
| 18 | Dai | DAI | Stablecoin pegged to USD. |
| 19 | NEAR Protocol | NEAR | Fast, scalable smart contracts. |
| 20 | Polygon | MATIC | Ethereum L2 scaling solution. |
| 21 | Uniswap | UNI | Decentralized Ethereum token exchange. |
| 22 | Litecoin | LTC | Silver to Bitcoin’s gold. |
| 23 | Kaspa | KAS | Secure, scalable PoW cryptocurrency. |
| 24 | Pepe | PEPE | Meme-inspired cryptocurrency. |
| 25 | Internet Computer | ICP | Decentralized world computer. |
| 26 | Ethereum Classic | ETC | Immutable smart contracts. |
| 27 | Artificial Superintelligence Alliance | FET | Fetch.ai utility token. |
| 28 | Monero | XMR | Private, anonymous cryptocurrency. |
| 29 | Aptos | APT | Scalable smart contracts in Move. |
| 30 | Stellar | XLM | Fast, cheap cross-border transfers. |
| 31 | Render | RNDR | Decentralized GPU rendering. |
| 32 | Hedera | HBAR | Asset tokenization platform. |
| 33 | Cosmos | ATOM | Interoperable blockchain ecosystem. |
| 34 | Arbitrum | ARB | Ethereum L2 scaling solution. |
| 35 | Cronos | CRO | DeFi and metaverse platform. |
| 36 | Filecoin | FIL | Decentralized storage network. |
| 37 | OKB | OKB | OKX exchange utility token. |
| 38 | Mantle | MNT | Ethereum L2 scaling solution. |
| 39 | Maker | MKR | Dai decentralized governance token. |
| 40 | VeChain | VET | Supply chain transparency blockchain. |
| 41 | Stacks | STX | Bitcoin smart contracts and DApps. |
| 42 | Injective | INJ | Interoperable DeFi smart contracts. |
| 43 | Immutable | IMX | Ethereum NFT L2 scaling solution. |
| 44 | First Digital USD | FDUSD | Stablecoin pegged to USD. |
| 45 | Sui | SUI | Fast smart contracts. |
| 46 | Optimism | OP | Ethereum L2 scaling solution. |
| 47 | Bittensor | TAO | Decentralized machine learning models. |
| 48 | Bonk | BONK | Dog-themed Solana memecoin. |
| 49 | The Graph | GRT | Decentralized indexing system. |
| 50 | Notcoin | NOT | Telegram-based play-to-earn token. |
I hope this post is helpful to anyone interested in investing in cryptocurrencies. If you find a mistake then feel free to post it in the comments.