Bitcoin Forum

The Pizza Purchase

The first retail purchase on May 22, 2010 is probably the most famous story in Bitcoin history. Jacksonville, Florida Bitcoin “miner” Laszlo Hanyecz pays 10,000 Bitcoins that he mined himself for two pizzas. At the time, Bitcoin did technically have an exchange rate of a few cents, but who knew that? The purchase price for the pizza was approximately U$25. Selling 10,000 units of unknown computer code for two real pizzas seemed like a great deal at the time.

“It wasn’t like Bitcoins had any value back then, so the idea of trading them for a pizza was incredibly cool,” Mr. Hanyecz told the New York Times recently.

The year of 2010 sees many first for Bitcoin, including the first escrow transaction (October 16), the first mobile transaction (December 8) and the first time Bitcoin’s total value exceeded US$1 million on November 6, with each bitcoin trading for approx. US$0.50. Bitcoin is now a real currency.


You Can find this interesting story along with "Top 10 Greatest Moments in Bitcoin History" here: http://cointelegraph.com/news/115146/top-10-greatest-moments-in-bitcoin-history

And the Original Pizza Story Started here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137.0

It was a good deal and if more of the bitcoin holders had done the same thing bitcoin would have been widespread today.

interesting story and also thanks for the link i want to read more stories like this
thats a nice deal for a pizza though

It was a world first(probably) for a trade made in online cryptocurrency.

OP, maybe link the original thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137.0

this is an old news many threads related to this have been around recently and also the orignal thread still got reply from people

still very shocking for me anything can happen there were many people who bought bitcoin when it were 600$ now it is 250$ the value can change huge in days

Such a great story, if you have followed Laszlo Hanyecz at all you know that he is passionate about Bitcoin and doesn't regret purchasing the pizza for that many coins. He is actually quite pleased that he is a part of its history  :)

Thank you very much for your suggestion, I have added the link to the post.

How about this
https://blockchain.info/address/19HhmfxGsznL8K7wXjZiFnhqddQucgfZzB

I once read someone asked for help to reset his bitcoin wallet password.
tread tap has been removed moderator for whatever reason I do not know yet.
he dares to pay dearly if anyone can hack his bitcoin wallet.

would be epic if someone could find the transaction id of this purchase. Or a link to the direct transaction on the blockchain.

I remember this well, and was just thinking about this the other day. Inflation adjusted, thats one hell of an expensive pizza.

i never new this story before, so im so amaze that the cost of 10k bitcoin before (2010) is good to buy a pizza. and incredibly if you hold that 10k bitcoin for now, you are a totally millionaire. and im agree that this story is the best story ive ever read in the history of bitcoin. imagine that 10k bitcoin, woooh! i admit that i miss the chance to buy bitcoin before. but who knows, no body knew that this bitcoin will succeed in our era now.

I remember hearing about a story about a guy buying pizza for 10,000 bitcoins.  The person who bought the pizza probably regrets it and kicking himself over the head.  The pizza place that bought the 10,000 bitcoins, well they probably have enough to franchise out and make multiple stores without spending their fiat money.  The best that pizza place can do to ease that guys pain is to call a pizza special by the guy's name who gave them 10,000 bitcoins.

As I have said above, if it were not for them, those people who made the first bitcoin transactions, these ecosystem as we know it nowaday would not exist.

The thing is, without this transaction, Bitcoin may never have become what it is today. This pizza could go down as being worth over a billion dollars. hahaha

It's certainly part of the learning curve for all of us and this example will also go down well to teach us about how to keep precious stuffs like bitcoin in the future. That story is even part of the reason why people are so keen on collecting altcoins that are cheap and mineable with a computer vat this time because it might soar later and so it has gone to increase the crave for cryptocurrencies in general.

Read the story for the very first time. What did the pizza company do with those bitcoins? Did they just sold them off or still holding them?

Using such large quantity of bitcoin to purchase pizza then can be liken to some of the token we are exchanging  today at a very low rate. when any of them appreciate, when anyone say I sold this token for $0.02 it will sound as if it was a lost treasure.

Hahaha yes i remember this and all the conspiracies that were around this story, and everytime i open the bitcoin discussion board i see this kind of threads refreshing my memory about that story.
It was crazy, it is like just exchanging 100 riples for a coca cola, and thinking about that then could be more than $100 in just a few years, or months, or who knows how much time?
There is a guy who sent 100 bitcoins for a transaction fee, that was a great story too.

I remember that story too, it was crazy, a few weeks ago another guy posted the same quoting that story, but it was much more discussed on reddit. The guy only sent about 50 bitcoins for the fees of the transaction, not 100. But it was not a "mistake", there isn't any person who would send that amount of money for fees purposes only because a mistake, he diserved it because he didn't take care of that bitcoins as much as he says that he did.

Yes I have already heard that story. Two pizzas bought by a dev, that will now remain in history as the most "expensive" pizzas ever bought.
Of course this also says a lot about the current use of bitcoin as a currency, or as a way to buy things. It's really hard to do it, because of it's volatility, I don't thin the dev regrets buying those pizzas, but for other people that don't have to much bitcoin, spending them, and then seeing their price increase, must be hard.

The person will continually regret this for the rest of his life and I will not heap a lot of scorn towards him because who know I might have done the same thing if I was in his shoes. But I am hoping for his sake that he had alot of bitcoins there after he used all these to buy the pizza.

oh this is very famous and classical story. whomever I try to explain bitcoin, I tell this story as it is historical moment :)

The good old days. Many users here have joined fairly recently. This is my second account in fact, the other one...got banned for something(not scam obviously), way back in 2011. It's been an interesting several years, tbh, I can't even believe that 6 years have passed since I learned about Bitcoin.

interesting and inspiring story, hopefully can give us a spirit as bitcoin hunters here. Every business there must be a way ..

I don't know what to say  , but I think both PIZZA and bitcoin are highly profitable for us   ;D ;D . In fact anything can happen in this crytpo world ( who knows , maybe 1 BTC will worth a car )

He was one of the first few people who walked the talk. I think it would be great to hear some updates from him since then. Did he store some more bitcoins in his wallet after he used 10,000 of it? And how much? I am curious. Perhaps he is holding some several thousands bitcoin. But we should also give due credit to the pizza store that accepted his payment in the form of 10,000 bitcoins. They were the pioneers.  

haha, he will not like that today.

I hope the pizza was good ^^

and he who has sold pizzas is certainly happy

Fascinating story ? more like a sad story all i can see is the guy having regrets selling his bitcoin with pizza that is 10000 bitcoin were today it couls value billions of dollars. Im curious to what happened to this guy after he bought pizza did you mined bitcoin again and store or quit? And the pizza store or owner must be a millionaire/billionaire right now.

Yes hahah this was insane, i remember those times when bitcoin was so cheap.. I saw a thread in where a lot of people were exchanging their bitcoins for paypal money, if i am not wrong, they were offering 15 bitcoins per a dollar in paypal paying the fees for that transaction.
Just imagine that. 15 bitcoins = 1 dollar. isn't it insane guys? i wish that i have a time machine to go back to those times, i would have a fortune right now.

I was talking to someone about this the other day. Does anyone know the address of the the two people it would be interesting to know if they are still very much involved with bitcoin.

 Thanks dear
 Laszlo Hanyecz at that time I read you already and like many others like me on the other side of the ocean we would gladly come and bring you the pizza ... And to give you some help to mince bitcoin. Even more beautiful and see that you have managed to pass on the story together this coin ... And a bit what you wanted also you ha ha ha ha ;D

  ;D Laszlo Hanyecz I do not think he had any regret xx those 10000 bitcoins he even disgusted me he was happy xke head how much the people on the line were interested in
   having  ;D
   bitcoin and then did not want to go home because he was too busy to undermine ...   sry I have to use the translator hi hi hi hi  ;D

Well this is all part of the lessons we've learnt over time that's why i don't let any one talk me down on bitcoin because you'll never know when you might be fucking yourself with your unbelief. I, like many others are also trying my best to stock as many bitcoins as i can because in the near future bitcoin will be greater in value and i can rely on it as my insurance.

It was a phenomenal story that ever existed, at the beginning I knew and wanted to know about bitcoin. some friends who first knew bitcoin told me about the separation price. if true. I feel proud of the development of bitcoin until now.

I heard that the guy who did that is regretting his choices of life and is crying right now because he could have bought the whole pizza place for himself and he would have gotten unlimited free pizza whenever he wants it.

I believe it was 10K Bitcoins, And it was the first transcation of goods for bitcoins. Which is pretty amazing to me.

Well the guy who ordered the pizza is now crying i think, because now bitcoin is worth a lot if he hadn't done that. He could be rich now and order 9999 pizzas for himself.

This was also the first transaction actually this is amazing.

I dont believe he regret it very much, surely this guy still hold a bunch of coins and is also a millionaire right now. Why should he stop mining them back in these days when he can buy pizzas from it haha
Also he will always be historical, because he paid 30 Million $ for a pizza with todays price  ;D

amazing story and one that can be told forever. There are some other interesting stories floating around of people actually losing bitcoins by tossing old hard drives out. Those stories are pretty awesome when you think about them for a minute. Invest in something, save and store it, forget about it and then wake p one day realised you basically tossed cash into the trash. just awesome

I have read this story over and over again but instead of it going away, it keeps coming back to me and to the community to hunt the person who made such decision and how much that amount would have worth as at today but who knows if he had not done what he did then, we wouldn't have something to talk about now. So, he has done well to be part of history for us to continue to make reference to.

Well I guess everyone who was into bitcoining that time doesnt have any idea that it would increase its value 10000 x. They were just taking it for granted. If that person was already into mining bitcoins before, he might still got alot of bitcoins stored for today.

Wow, most expensive pizza of all time haha. Hope it tasted amazing

Well during that time it seems it was a really good deal and of course mining bitcoin that time seems very easy. Imagine you are just using your laptop or pc and getting a Bitcoin.  Well it was a good advertisement for bitcoin since it was in the news. No one would think during  that time that bitcoin will be very valuable.Maybe i would do the same thing on that time and probably exchage it in paypal as well.

 I already heard of bitcoin during that time and just ignored it, i'm one of the person that really thought bitcoin will never work, dumb me. If I only have a time machine LOL.

OH My God, never heard that before. Was that real or its just a story created by some novelist? If it was real that guy would have heart attacked lol.

I bet he is still computing for the BTC he exchanged for pizza up to these day.
At the current price of 6000 dollars and multiplied it by 10k dollars, you can have a yacht, a real state, a resort or a shopping mall that can give you some real positive cash flow and meanwhile the pizza he intake and outtake is just a bacteria nowadays. This is one of the biggest regrets in history and one of the best lesson in holding BTC.

No, it was an important transaction that at the time had no value. It was a proof of concept that ultimately led way to where things are now. It had to happen.

Oh god,  i heard the same story few day age. i was surprised omg what he did?  now adays price of bitcoin is so high. everyone think if he can live instead of the pizza guy, he will never sale thouse coin.  ;D

You can say that again about the calculation and the pizza eater forever living in regrets till he dies. He truly deserves a place in the Guinness World Book of Records. Not just for exchanging his 10,000 units of mined bitcoins for a mere pizza like the biblical Esau but for being the first person to have carried out a widely recorded bitcoin transaction. He truly deserves a place in history, whether good or bad.