What Is Litecoin?

The “lite version of Bitcoin,” Litecoin (LTC) is a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency created by Charlie Lee, a former Google employee, in 2011. It has a circulating supply of 65,816,553 LTC coins and a max. supply of 84,000,000 LTC coins. Although it is based on the Bitcoin protocol, LTC is characterized by a markedly shorter transaction speed of 2.5 minutes per block (unless there is network congestion). Litecoin also differs from Bitcoin in that it uses the memory intensive Scrypt Proof of Work (PoW) mining algorithm, which allows users to mine Litecoin on a Mac or on Windows, solo or via a pool. Users that want to mine via CPUs or GPU turn to Scrypt for its accessibility, and ASIC-based mining rigs are not suitable for Litecoin mining. See below for a full selection of markets where you can trade Litecoin for other cryptocurrencies, US dollars, and other fiat currencies.