Bitcoin

How to spell bitcoin

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce bitcoin

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does bitcoin mean?

1. nounA decentralised digital currency that records transactions on a shared public ledger called a blockchain.

Bitcoin in a sentence

• She paid for the laptop using bitcoin instead of a credit card.

• The value of bitcoin rose sharply after the announcement.

Where does bitcoin come from?

Language of origin: Other

Bitcoin is a modern coinage, introduced in 2008 in a white paper published under the name Satoshi Nakamoto and launched as working software in early 2009. The name simply fuses two existing English words: 'bit', the smallest unit of digital information (itself a contraction of 'binary digit'), and 'coin', a piece of money. 'Coin' reached English through Old French 'coin', meaning a wedge or corner, from Latin 'cuneus', a wedge, because the metal dies used to stamp coins were wedge shaped. The blend captures the idea precisely: a coin that exists only as digital data rather than as a physical disc of metal. Because it began life as a proper product name, it is often capitalised when referring to the network or protocol and written lower case when referring to a unit of the currency, which is the main thing writers have to keep straight.

How the word is built

• bit (binary digit, the basic unit of computer data)
• coin (a piece of money)