Is it cheaper to send Bitcoin or Ethereum directly?

[Guessti]

Not counting the lightning network obviously, because anyone I guess could create a lightning network for any coin.

I already know the answer but please humor me because I'm talking to some other guys who are convinced the opposite of what I'm saying is true.

Ty.

[flimo]

Definitely Ethereum still but not for ERC20 tokens.

Eth gas fees were ($0.9187) and BTC gas fees were ($1.450) today. If you're comparing popularity as a payment method though, this just means BTC is still more widely used, hence more transaction fees. Payment processors like https://www.poof.io/ and https://cash.app/, Square, Coinbase... etc probably all have extremely high payment volume with Bitcoin.

[Guessti]

Definitely Ethereum still but not for ERC20 tokens.

Eth gas fees were ($0.9187) and BTC gas fees were ($1.450) today. If you're comparing popularity as a payment method though, this just means BTC is still more widely used, hence more transaction fees. Payment processors like https://www.poof.io/ and https://cash.app/, Square, Coinbase... etc probably all have extremely high payment volume with Bitcoin.

Thanks.

Can anyone else agree or disagree?

Also I been sending Eth to myself a few times, it is costing 30-60 cents as this tracker states:

https://etherscan.io/gastracker

I think maybe the tracker your using includes NFTs or something, this tracker has always been more accurate and shows NFTs and other fees seperate.

[Stalker22]

According to https://mempool.space Bitcoin mempool is practically empty right now. This means that all transactions, even with the lowest transaction fee of 1 sat/vB, will be confirmed in the next block.

In other words, the most basic segwit transaction with a single input and a single output will cost you about $0.03 at the current bitcoin rate.

[bitmover]

Definitely Ethereum still but not for ERC20 tokens.

Eth gas fees were ($0.9187) and BTC gas fees were ($1.450) today.

Thanks.

Can anyone else agree or disagree?

This is false.

Bitcoin is cheaper.

As Stalker22 said  , a transaction can now be confirmed within 10 minutes, one block, for $ 0.03

Ethereum is now less decentralized as before  to become cheaper..  but it is still about 30x more expansive than btc, which more decentralized.

[Guessti]

Definitely Ethereum still but not for ERC20 tokens.

Eth gas fees were ($0.9187) and BTC gas fees were ($1.450) today.

Thanks.

Can anyone else agree or disagree?

This is false.

Bitcoin is cheaper.

As Stalker22 said  , a transaction can now be confirmed within 10 minutes, one block, for $ 0.03

Ethereum is now less decentralized as before  to become cheaper..  but it is still about 30x more expansive than btc, which more decentralized.

Then why are all the sites showing Bitcoin costs $1-$3 to send. Cashapp for example hovers around $2 to get a 10 minute transaction, or $1 for a 2 hour transaction. Coinbase is a bit cheaper usually hovering around $1

Since when can you send BTC for 3 cents?

[hosseinimr93]

Then why are all the sites showing Bitcoin costs $1-$3 to send. Cashapp for example hovers around $2 to get a 10 minute transaction, or $1 for a 2 hour transaction. Coinbase is a bit cheaper usually hovering around $1

That's because they charge you extra fee.
When you withdraw bitcoin from a custodial service like coinbase, you pay the fee to the service instead of paying miners directly. Custodial services usually charge you more than the fee they pay to miners.
If you use a non-custodial wallet which allows you to set the fee rate yourself, you can make bitcoin transactions with much lower fees.

[dothebeats]

Most of the time, ETH, but if the other party needs to receive it as BTC, of course it's way better to send it as is. There are times of the day wherein BTC fees are cheaper and you can get away with less than a few cents worth of fees, but it's not really consistent within the day so switching to ETH might be more economical before hitting send on your PC. You can use other alts for the same purpose too, but of course value will be an issue especially if the other party needs to get it as BTC or ETH and would not want an exchange to add to the equation.

[DaveF]

Usually BTC is cheaper. But with either one the mempool can fill and if you want to be in the next block or the next few blocks it's going to cost you more.
I made several BTC transactions today for under $0.05

https://mempool.space/tx/6c4028d851894238144e68fcca999ec1cbb3b2f1318f17655d4c874477287329

Yesterday for a similar sized transaction that I wanted in the next block it cost me close to $0.30 If I could have waited I could have done it for $0.05 but I wanted to be sure the person I was sending it to saw that it was confirmed before I left the office.

-Dave

[Guessti]

Wow, so the community so far is showing a split in opinions to which is cheaper without a very clear answer.

If you have to know I said Ethereum on average is cheaper, which some are agreeing, and others even here are disagreeing.

Did something change? Even when I use to use a actual bitcoin client I remember the fees always being higher than Ether.

Also the way Cashapp has it setup, makes it look like your paying the fees not to them but to the network.

I can see 3-10 cent transactions on Bitcoin, but on blockchain explorer I'm often seeing them over $1+

I might have gotten a bit dated on this information, but now I'm having a hard time finding a very clear cut answer.

[DaveF]

Some BTC clients / services use high fees when they are not needed.
Picking on Coinomi (which sucks but it's a good indicator) for a 'normal' speed transaction $0.45
Core for the same transaction is about the same.
Electrum is showing close to $0.60
As of now a 4sat/byte fee will get you into the next block. So they are all higher then needed.

Exchanges tend to have higher fees so they (1) can make a profit and (2) put in a stupid high fee so you WILL be in the next block.

Taking a look at block 761894 you had people paying a fee of over 300 sat /vbyte when a fee of 1 would have made it into the block.
https://mempool.space/block/0000000000000000000024ddfbc4301595359c0477810c70b6a6ea9ed217aebb

Either really bad programming or people who just don't understand or....

ETH is the same way.
Some people paid 11.77 Gwei in the last block others paid a lot more.....

-Dave

[tabas]

I used to transact these days with bitcoin by just putting a 1-3sat of fee as it quicker to transfer these days.
While for Ethereum, obviously the fees are volatile and most of the times, they are not really cheap at all.
Buy it all dependa to the wallet that you use, there are the wallets that usually put it into priority fee as suggested by them.

[Baofeng]

I guess it is based on what wallet you are using,

Electrum for one, you can used the slider and adjust how much you are willing to pay for a transaction.

I usually set it at just around $0.12, yes, it is very cheap and the transaction usually completes in about and hour or even less than that.

[bitmover]

Wow, so the community so far is showing a split in opinions to which is cheaper without a very clear answer.

If you have to know I said Ethereum on average is cheaper, which some are agreeing, and others even here are disagreeing.

This is not a matter of opinions. The community is not split.

There a few people here who are spreading misinformation , that's all. You are included in these people.

The data is open. Just look at etherscan.io and mempool.space and check is 1 usd is bigger than 0.03 usd

I can see 3-10 cent transactions on Bitcoin, but on blockchain explorer I'm often seeing them over $1+

I might have gotten a bit dated on this information, but now I'm having a hard time finding a very clear cut answer.

If you want to make a 0.03-0.10 usd transaction, just make a transaction from your wallet with 1 sat/vbyte fee.

Then why are all the sites showing Bitcoin costs $1-$3 to send. Cashapp for example hovers around $2 to get a 10 minute transaction, or $1 for a 2 hour transaction. Coinbase is a bit cheaper usually hovering around $1

Since when can you send BTC for 3 cents?

You cannot blame the network for using an expensive third party service. You are paying coinbase fees,  not bitcoin fees.

[hatshepsut93]

Not counting the lightning network obviously, because anyone I guess could create a lightning network for any coin.

You guess wrong, it's not as simple as taking LN code, switching a few lines and having a functioning LN on an altcoin. Coins that are closer to Bitcoin in their architecture will have an easier time of pulling that off (but still not easy), but most of the coins that that were released in the last 6 years have very different codebase and architecture, so it would take a ton of effort to implement LN for them.

I already know the answer but please humor me because I'm talking to some other guys who are convinced the opposite of what I'm saying is true.

The answer is that they both have high fees when they hit the limits of their on-chain capacity. So the answer depends on the current state of their mempools.  In recent times Ethereum tends to be more expensive.

[tbct_mt2]

Bitcoin has cheaper transaction fee than Ethereum.

However when you are discussing about transaction fee, you should know that you have no control about that if you are using a centralized service for your coin. When you make a withdrawal request, they will approve it (or disapprove it) and proceed it by broadcasting it to Bitcoin or Ethereum network. Centralized services charge very expensive withdrawal fee on users.

Fortunately, if you are using a non custodial wallet, you can control your coin inputs (for each transaction) and fee rate you want to broadcast that transaction.

Generally you can check average transaction fees on Bitcoin or Ethereum network with Blockchair.com's tool: https://blockchair.com/compare
Choosing Bitcoin, Ethereum and unchoosing other blockchains. You can get comparisons between Bitcoin and Ethereum network including their average transaction fees.

[LegendaryK]

Not counting the lightning network obviously, because anyone I guess could create a lightning network for any coin.

I already know the answer but please humor me because I'm talking to some other guys who are convinced the opposite of what I'm saying is true.

Ty.

* Average Fees are used below, because while some may lowball the transaction fee,
the majority are not willing to wait 3-48 hours for a lowball transaction to complete.
Some lowball offers are rejected wasting the 48 hours.
Also due to the variance in a Coin's Price verses the US $, waiting too long is not a real option when paying for something.*

https://bitinfocharts.com/comparison/bitcoin-transactionfees.html#3y
Current Average price is $1.33 per BTC transaction

* For a single LN transaction*
You pay $1.33 once to lock and once to unlock, so $2.66 plus what the LN network charges which varies by hops.
LN actually cost more than a single bitcoin onchain transaction unless you are transacting more than 5 times with the same person.
FYI: LN is for banks not individuals.


https://ycharts.com/indicators/ethereum_average_transaction_fee
Current Average price is $0.66 per Ethereum transaction
* So at the moment Ethereum is cheaper to send by more than ½ btc transaction fee.*

Prices of either are subject to change with increased transactions.
BTC will always go higher in transaction fees faster than ethereum due to the limited blocksize and the defective proof of waste design.

https://ycharts.com/indicators/ethereum_transactions_per_day
Ethereum is making ~1 million transactions per day.

https://ycharts.com/indicators/bitcoin_transactions_per_day
Bitcoin pathetic Proof of Waste design is only ¼ the transaction volume of ethereum at <300000 per day.

Cheapest and Fastest way is using an Exchange
Using an Exchange to transact Offchain between Exchange Users
can be done with zero transaction fees for either BTC or Ethereum.
And by using the exchange you avoid locking fees of LN.

[Despairo]

Cheapest and Fastest way is using an Exchange
Using an Exchange to transact Offchain between Exchange Users
can be done with zero transaction fees for either BTC or Ethereum.
And by using the exchange you avoid locking fees of LN.

LOL

Exchange has a minimum amount to withdraw your coins and they're usually charge for fixed fees, no matter how much the real miner fees charged. This mean even though you can send Bitcoin with 1 sat/byte that will cost you only few cents, but the exchange can ask 50,000 satoshi to able withdraw your coins, 50,000 satoshi is 0.0005 BTC or $10 currently.

The best way to avoid large fees is avoid to use centralized exchange and closed source wallet e.g. Trustwallet, Atomic etc. Only use non custodial wallet, open source and use segwit address e.g. Electrum or Bluewallet.

[EarnOnVictor]

Not counting the lightning network obviously, because anyone I guess could create a lightning network for any coin.

I already know the answer but please humor me because I'm talking to some other guys who are convinced the opposite of what I'm saying is true.

I don't think anyone sensible should scold you for a gentleman's question, after all, we are a community of education/information here and you might truly be a newbie in the world of cryptocurrency. Bitcoin transaction fees are way lower than that of Ethereum, to the extent that they might be more than 10 times lower in normal circumstances.

This is why I only like Ethereum for investment but can never use it for transactions where I have Bitcoin as an option.

[examplens]

Definitely Ethereum still but not for ERC20 tokens.

Eth gas fees were ($0.9187) and BTC gas fees were ($1.450) today.

Thanks.

Can anyone else agree or disagree?

This is false.

Bitcoin is cheaper.

As Stalker22 said  , a transaction can now be confirmed within 10 minutes, one block, for $ 0.03

Ethereum is now less decentralized as before  to become cheaper..  but it is still about 30x more expansive than btc, which more decentralized.

now that most erc20 tokens dead are in hibernation, it became potentially comparable. hence this kind of discussion and comparison.

Then why are all the sites showing Bitcoin costs $1-$3 to send. Cashapp for example hovers around $2 to get a 10 minute transaction, or $1 for a 2 hour transaction. Coinbase is a bit cheaper usually hovering around $1

Since when can you send BTC for 3 cents?

I regularly send it with a fee under $1 from my Trezor wallet. it could be less if I do not want an instant transaction.