12 Best Crypto to Buy Now in October 2023

With the cryptocurrency markets still in an uncertain position, many crypto investors are wondering if it’s time to sell in order to avoid further losses or if the market is going to recover soon. 

Even though the crypto markets have so far always recovered from their bearish periods, every bear market has its “casualties” that never make a strong recovery. Therefore, it’s important to choose quality crypto projects that have a good chance of surviving the bear market and thriving in the future.

We’ve analyzed 200 of the top cryptocurrencies based on their liquidity and availability, technology, sector leadership, tokenomics and more key factors. You can read more about our criteria a bit further down in the article.

By doing so, we’ve narrowed the list down to 12 cryptocurrencies that present the most compelling opportunities at the moment. The top three coins on our list are updated weekly to reflect the most up-to-date developments in the crypto and blockchain sector. Here's our roundup of the best cryptocurrency to invest in 2023:

Ethereum - The leading blockchain for smart contracts Solana - High-performance blockchain platform for smart contracts Polygon - A suite of Ethereum scaling solutions Bitcoin - Decentralized peer-to-peer cryptocurrency BNB - A popular cryptocurrency utilized in the Binance ecosystem Uniswap - The biggest DEX on Ethereum Cosmos - A network of interoperable blockchains GMX - A decentralized crypto derivatives exchange Mina Protocol - An extremely lightweight blockchain Litecoin - A cheaper and faster alternative to Bitcoin Shiba Inu - Meme coin on the Ethereum blockchain Zcash - Privacy coin utilizing zero-knowledge technology

Best Cryptos to Buy Right Now

Let’s start off by highlighting three cryptocurrency projects that have seen important developments recently, or have big events coming up in the near future. We update these highlighted coins on a weekly basis to reflect the latest developments in the world of crypto and blockchain.

Before we dive into our list of the best cryptos to buy, we should note that choosing which crypto to buy is only the first step in your crypto investment journey. It's also important to choose the right platform to buy crypto, and you also have to decide how you will be storing your cryptocurrency.

In our opinion, the best way to invest in crypto is to transfer your coins to a hardware wallet after you buy it on an exchange. A great starting point is to buy cryptocurrency on KuCoin and store it in a Ledger hardware wallet.

1. Ethereum

Ethereum is a blockchain that supports smart contracts, enabling more complex use cases such as decentralized lending protocols and non-fungible tokens. The Ethereum project was founded by Vitalik Buterin, who published the Ethereum whitepaper in late 2013. The Ethereum blockchain launched in July 2015.

One of the first use-cases enabled by Ethereum that gained a lot of traction was the ability to issue custom tokens that could be transacted over the Ethereum blockchain. This feature was utilized by many projects to conduct fundraising through Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) and other types of token sales.

Today, Ethereum has an extremely vibrant ecosystem of decentralized applications – including decentralized financial services, NFT marketplaces, publishing platforms, decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges, and more – which makes it a good investment in 2023, in our opinion.

ETH is the native asset of the Ethereum blockchain, providing an incentive for users to secure the network. The Ethereum network originally implemented a Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism, but switched over to Proof-of-Stake in September of 2022.

Why Ethereum?

Recently, United States-based asset management firm Valkyrie received approval to add Ethereum futures exposure to its Valkyrie Bitcoin Strategy ETF. The product is the first of its kind in the United States market to give investors exposure to the two largest crypto assets on the market.

While spot remains in limbo, Ether futures ETFs highly likely (90% odds) to start rolling out in early Oct. Valkyrie first (albeit with a btc + eth ETF) followed by dozen+ straight ether futures ETFs. Gonna be a wild race albeit w/ much lower stakes than spot via @JSeyff pic.twitter.com/no8kP5DTZt

— Eric Balchunas (@EricBalchunas) September 27, 2023

Meanwhile, asset manager VanEck is preparing to launch an ETF that tracks Ethereum futures. The Ethereum Strategy ETF (EFUT) will trade on the CBOE exchange. The fund will invest in Ethereum futures contracts traded on the CFTC-regulated exchange CME.

These recent developments will make it easier for different types of investors, including institutional investors, to invest in ETH through the traditional market infrastructure. This could position the second-largest crypto asset in a strong spot for the next crypto bull run.

2. Solana

Solana is a smart contracts platform with a unique architecture that allows it to process thousands of transactions per second while keeping costs extremely low. Solana achieves this by utilizing a unique Proof-of-History algorithm and a Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism. SOL is among the cheapest cryptos to transfer on the market, as users pay less than $0.001 per transaction on average.

Solana was founded in 2018 by Anatoly Yakovenko. The platform’s mainnet launched in March 2020, and saw a huge boost in adoption in 2021. While SOL has lost a lot of its value in the 2022 bear market, Solana still has one of the most impressive ecosystems in the cryptocurrency sector.

Why Solana?

The Solana project has seen a string of promising developments recently, which has translated into positive market sentiment and a rally in the SOL markets. In the last 7 days, Solana was the second best performer in the cryptocurrency top 100, recording a gain of 24% against the US dollar. However, the coin is now approaching the $25 price level, which provided resistance in July and August.

Some of the good news Solana has recently benefited from include an integration of Solana Pay with ecommerce giant Shopify, a Solana-based stablecoin settlement pilot launched by Visa, as well as the release of the v.1.16 Solana protocol update. The Solana team is also currently conducting its Hyperdrive hackathon, which could bring further innovations to the Solana ecosystem.

SOL will be a very interesting asset to watch in the next week. Will the coin extend its rally or will the $25 resistance level prove too strong for the bulls to overcome?

3. Polygon

Polygon is a Proof-of-Stake blockchain platform that’s compatible with Ethereum. It has emerged as one of the most popular Ethereum alternatives after Ethereum started suffering from high transaction fees.

Polygon’s native asset is called MATIC, and it is used for key operations on the network like staking and paying transaction fees. Polygon is one of the first Ethereum scaling platforms to gain significant adoption, which helped the team launch a number of initiatives to further accelerate growth.

Developers on Polygon can build any type of decentralized application that would also be possible to build on Ethereum, and they can also benefit from the suite of development tools that are available to Ethereum developers. This has made Polygon a very popular option for projects that want to build within the Ethereum framework, but require improved scalability.

Why Polygon?

Polygon is one of the most active projects in the crypto and blockchain ecosystem, and the Polygon ecosystem has recently been enhanced by Google Cloud joining the Polygon PoS platform as a validator. Google Cloud is the second large company to join the Polygon PoS validator set, with Deutsche Telekom also joining the network in May of this year.

This month, @GoogleCloud became part of the decentralized validator set for Polygon PoS. The same infrastructure used to power @YouTube and @gmail is now helping to secure the fast, low-cost, Ethereum-for-all Polygon protocol. With 100+ validators securing the Polygon PoS…

— Polygon (Labs) (@0xPolygonLabs) September 29, 2023

In addition to the Google Cloud news, the Polygon ecosystem will also be enhanced on October 10 when Circle will launch a native version of the USD Coin stablecoin on the Polygon blockchain. Native USDC will likely be a superior alternative to the bridged version of USDC that’s currently being used on Polygon.

MATIC has been seeing some solid momentum as of late, gaining just under 10% against USD in the last week.

4. Bitcoin

Bitcoin is a decentralized peer-to-peer cryptocurrency that was initially described in 2008 and launched in early 2009. Bitcoin was invented by a person using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, whose real identity is still unknown.

Bitcoin introduced the concept of a blockchain and provides a fully decentralized digital currency that’s extremely secure. It implements Proof-of-Work to make it very difficult to alter the history of transactions or double spend coins. The network is secured by miners, who are rewarded with BTC coins for adding blocks to the Bitcoin blockchain.

BTC can be sent anywhere in the world on a 24/7 basis, and transactions cannot be blocked by any intermediaries. By holding their own private keys, users can self-custody their Bitcoin without requiring institutions such as banks.

Even though countless cryptocurrencies and blockchain platforms have been released after Bitcoin, BTC is still easily the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.

Why Bitcoin?

The Bitcoin market is still in a precarious position as the world’s largest cryptocurrency has been hovering around the $26,000 mark for the past week. Although the bulls attempted to take Bitcoin out of its narrow range on August 23, the rally lost steam at $26,730 and the BTC price quickly retreated back to $26,000.

One of the reasons for the continued weakness in the cryptocurrency markets is likely that U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell has made hawkish comments in his recent appearance at Jackson Hole, suggesting that the Fed is planning to continue with its policy of raising interest rates.

In his speech, Powell stated that inflation in the United States remains too high and that the Fed intends »to hold policy at a restrictive level« until they are confident that inflation in the U.S. is moving towards the 2% target. 

In a speech at the weekend, US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said inflation was still too high, and flagged the possibility of at least one more interest rate rise. #RNBreakfasthttps://t.co/bE9VQj14X1

— ABC News (@abcnews) August 27, 2023

If the Fed will continue with its hawkish policies, that would imply a stronger U.S. dollar, which tends to put pressure on risk assets, including cryptocurrencies.

$26,000 has been a key support level for Bitcoin since around August 18. A significant breakdown below this level could translate to even bigger losses for altcoins, which have already been performing poorly as of late.

Friend.tech is currently seeing a boom in popularity. According to on-chain data tracker DeFi Llama, the platform has collected more than $1.42 million in fees over the last 24 hours and is currently seeing the third highest 24-hour revenue among all decentralized apps and blockchains.

Another notable development for the Ethereum ecosystem is the upcoming launch of the Holesky testnet. Ethereum core developers say that the Holesky testnet, which is designed to provide enhanced testing capabilities to Ethereum developers, is slated for launch in September. Notably, Holesky will feature a much larger ETH supply in a bid to make it easier for developers to get their hands on testnet ETH.

5. BNB

BNB is a token that was launched by the Binance cryptocurrency exchange in 2017. BNB serves two primary functions. Holders of the token get access to special benefits when using Binance – this includes lower trading fees, access the exchange’s Launchpad and Launchpool programs, cashback on Binance Visa card purchases, and more.

The token is also used as the native asset of the BNB Chain blockchain. BNB Chain is a variant of Ethereum that offers significantly lower transaction fees to users, and it allows developers to easily deploy EVM-compatible decentralized applications. Previously known as Binance Coin, BNB has now gone through an extensive rebranding.

Why BNB?

As we’ve already mentioned above, BNB Chain users will have a layer 2 option thanks to the opBNB platform, which was first announced last week. The platform, which is currently in the testnet phase, is expected to handle more than 4,000 transactions per second while keeping transaction fees at a fraction of a cent.

As blockchain technology continues to evolve, scalability remains a critical challenge. But fear not! Enter opBNB, a game-changing Layer 2 scaling solution designed to overcome the limitations of Layer 1 (L1) networks. Let's discuss opBNB below ?https://t.co/irYn1OPtfQ

— BNB Chain (@BNBCHAIN) June 19, 2023

A layer 2 for BNB Chain is building on the platform’s biggest strength, and will make the BNB Chain even more accessible to a broader range of users.

BNB will also be an interesting coin to follow in the weeks ahead for more negative reasons. The SEC’s lawsuit against Binance and Binance.US has created some uncertainty surrounding BNB, and the coin’s price dropped significantly as a result.

In addition, Binance has recently left the Dutch because it couldn’t get the necessary regulatory approvals. The exchange has also been ordered by Belgian regulators to stop offering its services in the country.

While Binance has actively tried to create distance between itself and BNB, it’s still the coin’s key backer and any further negative news will most likely impact BNB. On the flipside, BNB could have a strong recovery if Binance navigates its current predicament successfully.

6. Uniswap

Uniswap is a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange that introduced and popularized the AMM (automated market maker) model. This unique design removes the need for order books, providing an elegant way for swapping between different tokens directly on the blockchain without relying on intermediaries.

The Uniswap protocol is decentralized, and anyone can create liquidity pools for any token. This means that the newest crypto assets are often traded on Uniswap before they make their way on centralized cryptocurrency exchanges.

The model introduced by Uniswap has been adopted by many decentralized exchanges on different blockchain platforms. However, Uniswap remains the most active decentralized exchange in terms of trading volume.

Uniswap is governed by holders of the UNI token, who can submit and vote for proposals. UNI was distributed to past users of the Uniswap protocol via an airdrop in 2020, and the token is now available for purchase on a variety of both decentralized and centralized trading platforms.

Why Uniswap?

The Uniswap protocol recently a record daily trading volume at $11.84 billion. This was almost twice as much volume as the protocol’s previous daily volume record. 

? @Uniswap at almost $12b in daily volume, hitting 11 digits for the first time ever!!! ? I don't often tweet volume milestones anymore but that's over 5% of Nasdaq https://t.co/ZUszhiUNPu

— hayden.eth ? (@haydenzadams) March 12, 2023

Uniswap hit its record as users rushed in to trade USDC, the major stablecoin that came under pressure over the weekend after the failure of Silicon Valley Bank. The reason why this failure was relevant to USDC is that Circle, a key issuer of the USDC stablecoin, disclosed that $3.3 billion out of the roughly total $40 billion in funds backing USDC are held at Silicon Valley Bank.

This volume surge shows that the Uniswap protocol is a key piece of infrastructure for the crypto markets, and can successfully handle very large volumes even during periods of chaos in the market.

In addition, the Uniswap project has recently also announced a non-custodial mobile wallet that supports the Ethereum mainnet as well as the Arbitrum and Optimism layer 2 scalability platforms. 

7. Cosmos

Cosmos is a network that’s designed to allow different blockchain platforms to interoperate with each other. The Cosmos network is coordinated by the Cosmos Hub, a Proof-of-Stake blockchain. The Cosmos Hub is also designed to facilitate connections with blockchains outside of the Cosmos ecosystem, for example Bitcoin and Ethereum. The different blockchains that make up Cosmos communicate through a protocol called IBC (Inter-Blockchain Communication). 

The Cosmos Hub and other blockchains in the Cosmos network are built using the Cosmos SDK framework. Blockchains launched on Cosmos benefit from a robust Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism, fast transaction times (about 7 seconds) and low transaction costs (about $0.01 per transaction).

The native asset of Cosmos is called ATOM. Users can stake their ATOM tokens to contribute to the network’s security as well as earn staking rewards and a portion of the transaction fees collected by the network.

Why Cosmos?

On March 15, the Cosmos network will receive its v9-Lambda upgrade, which will introduce replicated security (RS) to the network. This will allow blockchains in the Cosmos network to essentially lease security from the Cosmos Hub by allowing validators on Cosmos Hub to produce blocks for them. The upgrade is part of the broader concept of interchain security (ICS), which the Cosmos project is gradually rolling out.

Replicated security will allow Cosmos-based projects to focus on their unique strengths instead of having to worry about their validators and security. Meanwhile, ATOM stakers could see some extra yield since up to 25% of the fees collected by "consumer chains" will be going to Cosmos Hub stakers.

At launch, only pre-approved blockchains in the Cosmos network will be able to use the replicated security feature. Eligible blockchains are selected through Cosmos governance.

8. GMX

GMX is a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange specialized in derivatives, more specifically perpetual futures contracts. The GMX exchange is currently available on the Arbitrum and Avalanche blockchain platforms.

The GMX ecosystem features two tokens: GMX and GLP. GMX is a utility and governance token which accrues 30% of the fees collected on the GMX exchange. Meanwhile, GLP is the platform’s liquidity provider token, which accrues 70% of the fees collected on the exchange.

GLP represents an index that currently consists of 8 different crypto assets which are supported on the GMX exchange for swaps and leverage trading. Users can mint GLP by supplying any of the supported assets to the pool, or redeem GLP for assets held by the pool.

The platform supports trading with up to 50x leverage, which is competitive compared to most centralized crypto derivatives platforms.

Why GMX?

Centralized cryptocurrency exchanges are under increased scrutiny after the collapse of FTX. In addition, the failure of many centralized crypto lending businesses has also negatively impacted the reputation of centralized crypto businesses more broadly.

While centralized exchanges still reign supreme in terms of trading volume, an increasing number of crypto investors is looking for decentralized alternatives. The sector of decentralized crypto derivatives is still relatively new, which means that there could be a lot of upside for platforms such as GMX. That's the main reason why we featured GMX as one of the best new cryptocurrencies to buy.

GMX TVL hit a new all-time high of $482.78m today pic.twitter.com/RqJ61AfF40

— DefiLlama.com (@DefiLlama) October 27, 2022

9. Mina Protocol

Mina Protocol is a project that’s building an extremely lightweight blockchain. With the help of zero-knowledge technology, the size of the Mina blockchain is kept at just 22 kilobytes at all times.

The Mina Protocol’s version of decentralized applications is called zkApps. The smart contracts these applications are built with support zero-knowledge proofs, which can allow users to prove ownership of their data without disclosing the data itself to the party they’re interacting with. zkApps can also source data from any website privately, providing easy access to real-world data instead of relying on complicated oracle systems.

Why Mina Protocol?

Zero-knowledge technology is likely to become a very important trend in the crypto and blockchain space moving forward, and Mina Protocol could be positioned very well to take advantage of this.

In addition, the lightweight design of the Mina Blockchain makes it easier to participate in the network, which is especially relevant for mobile devices. If we’re going to see widespread adoption of blockchain technology, it’s most likely that a large number of people will be using blockchain through mobile devices. This could make Mina a candidate to become one of the next cryptocurrencies to explode.

10. Litecoin

Litecoin is a cryptocurrency that was initially launched in October 2011, making it one of the oldest “altcoins” on the market. Litecoin is heavily based on Bitcoin, as it started off as essentially a modified version of Bitcoin’s codebase.

Litecoin has a maximum coin supply of 84 million, which is 4 times larger than that of Bitcoin. Its targeted block time is 2.5 minutes, which is 4 times faster than Bitcoin’s targeted block time. Just like Bitcoin, Litecoin also uses Proof-of-Work to reach consensus about the state of its Ledger. While Bitcoin uses the SHA-256 hash function, Litecoin uses the scrypt hash function.

Sometimes, Litecoin has been used as a proving ground for technologies that were later implemented into Bitcoin. For example, SegWit was first implemented into Litecoin before it went live on the Bitcoin network. However, Litecoin also has some unique technological aspects to it, most notably its support for MimbleWimble privacy technology.

Litecoin fans often describe Litecoin as the “silver to Bitcoin’s gold”. LTC transactions are cheaper and faster than BTC transactions, making Litecoin a more suitable option for everyday payments.

Why Litecoin?

The next Litecoin halving is expected to take place on August 2 at 1:30 PM UTC. Litecoin has been a strong performer in the past couple of months as traders have been accumulating their LTC positions ahead of the upcoming halving. LTC is up +38% since the start of the year and is currently the 11th largest digital currency by market capitalization.

Racing to the HALVING!! Less than 2000 blocks to go! #Litecoin $LTC #sundayvibes #Litecoinhalving pic.twitter.com/5HP9iIuSf3

— Litecoin (@litecoin) July 30, 2023

According to blockchain analytics firm LunarCrush, Litecoin has had “the strongest combined social and trading activity across the crypto market” as of late. “Social engagement continues to spike higher, indicating increased community activity and participation within social posts,” LunarCrush wrote about the trending coin.

In addition to the excitement surrounding the halving, the institutional investor narrative has been very strong in crypto as of late – firms like Blackrock, Fidelity, and several others filed Bitcoin ETF applications over the past couple of weeks, signaling that institutions consider crypto as a part of their long term strategies. In the midst of this mounting investor interest, LTC has been listed on the EDX Markets exchange as one of the four cryptocurrencies on the platform. EDX Markets is a cryptocurrency trading platform backed by financial industry heavyweights, including Fidelity and Citadel Securities.

Another reason why Litecoin has been doing well as of late could be that LTC doesn’t appear to be in danger of being labeled an unregistered security by U.S. regulators. In its recent lawsuits against Binance and Coinbase, the SEC has alleged that several cryptocurrencies offered by the exchanges are unregistered securities, but didn’t mention Litecoin as one of them.

11. Shiba Inu

Shiba Inu is a meme cryptocurrency that was launched in 2020 by a person using the pseudonym “Ryoshi”. The project is heavily inspired by the Dogecoin cryptocurrency, and also features the Shiba Inu dog breed in its branding. In contrast to Dogecoin, which has its own blockchain, Shiba Inu is issued on the Ethereum blockchain as an ERC-20 token.

During the SHIB token launch, half of the supply was sent to Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin (who is not involved with the project in any way). The project framed this as a token burn. Buterin did eventually burn the vast majority of his SHIB holdings and sold the rest of his tokens to fund charitable donations.

SHIB saw a significant spike in popularity in 2021 and became the second largest meme coin by market cap, second only to Dogecoin. In addition, SHIB is one of the most popular penny cryptos at the moment.

Why Shiba Inu?

The launch of the Shiba Inu project’s Shibarium layer 2 platform is imminent, as the platform will be unveiled during the Blockchain Futurist Conference, which will be taking place between August 15 and 16 in Toronto, Canada.

Notably, Shibarium is expected to include a mechanism in which SHIB tokens are burned with each transaction, which could contribute to the token becoming a more attractive asset to hold over the long term.

Another exciting development for Shiba Inu fans is that the project’s lead developer Shytoshi Kusama has teased that Shiba Inu is close to revealing three major partnerships. 

Big things are coming #SHIBARMY ? @ShytoshiKusama provided a discord update yesterday revealing a thrilling secret: we’ve got not one, not two, but THREE incredible partnershibs in the works ? Keep your eyes peeled for more info #PartnershibsIncoming https://t.co/eKKbu5rylJ

— Shib (@Shibtoken) August 10, 2023

SHIB has been a strong performer as of late, even though the action in the Bitcoin and Ethereum markets has been unexciting. At the time of writing, Shiba Inu is among the top 10 best crypto performers in the 30-day period.

12. Zcash

Initially proposed in a publication entitled "Zerocash" in 2014, Zcash is a decentralized public peer-to-peer cryptocurrency launched in 2016 that offers features similar to Bitcoin with a twist of unique privacy and security features found only in a handful of public digital currencies.

More specifically, ZEC was the first cryptocurrency to leverage 'zk-SNARKS', a zero-knowledge protocol that was considered among the top 10 breakthrough technologies of 2018 according to MIT's Technology Review.

New ZEC coins are introduced into the circulating supply through mining - Zcash is a cryptocurrency based on Proof-of-Work. Tokenomics-wise, Zcash has kept the same 21 million total supply cap introduced by Bitcoin. Similarly to Bitcoin, Zcash also has a halving mechanism. The first Zcash halving happened at block height 1,046,400 in 2020.

The Zcash project is very likely to adopt a Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism in the future, as Zcash’s main developer Electric Coin Company and the majority of the Zcash community have expressed support for transitioning away from Proof-of-Work.

Why Zcash?

Recently, a new partnership was announced between Brave, Filecoin Foundation and Electric Coin Company. As part of the partnership, the Brave browser will integrate support for the Zcash protocol into its crypto wallet, giving users the option to send and receive ZEC privately.

A partnership deal over a year in the making — ECC ? @FilFoundation ? @brave. Shielded @Zcash will be integrated into the Brave browser wallet, and teams will begin work on a new private messaging feature.https://t.co/5Mylwuw8mi pic.twitter.com/85RCzqqNQl

— Electric Coin Co. (@ElectricCoinCo) September 22, 2023

In addition, the three partners mentioned plans to launch a private messaging and media sharing service that will be integrated in the Brave browser. The Zcash protocol will be used to transmit messages and media privately, while the IPFS decentralized file system will be used for storing encrypted content.

In the last month, Zcash has displayed modestly positive price action, gaining about 4.3%. However, the coin’s year-to-date performance has been disappointing, as ZEC has seen a 31% price drop against USD since January 1.

  Native asset Launched in Description Market cap* Ethereum ETH 2015 The leading platform for smart contracts and DApps $205 billion Solana SOL 2020 High-performance blockchain for smart contracts $10 billion Polygon MATIC 2020 A suite of Ethereum scaling solutions $4.5 billion Bitcoin BTC 2020 Decentralized peer-to-peer cryptocurrency $552 billion BNB BNB 2017 BNB Chain's native asset and token used in Binance ecosystem $33.7 billion Uniswap UNI 2020 The biggest decentralized exchange protocol $2.7 billion Cosmos ATOM 2019 A network of interconnected blockchains $2.7 billion GMX GMX 2021 Decentralized crypto derivatives trading platform $370 million Mina Protocol MINA 2021 Extremely lightweight blockchain with ZK technology $386 million Litecoin LTC 2011 A cheaper and faster alternative to Bitcoin $5 billion Shiba Inu SHIB 2020 Meme coin on the Ethereum blockchain $4.4 billion Zcash ZEC 2016 Privacy coin using zero-knowledge technology $467 million

*Data as of October 2, 2023, at 11:00 UTC.

Best crypto to buy for beginners

If you're a new entrant in the cryptocurrency space, it's probably best to stick to cryptocurrencies that have been around for a longer period of time and have a well-developed ecosystem of resources for users. This will make it easier for you to set up your wallet and find answers if you encounter any problems along the way.

If you're a beginner, consider sticking to cryptocurrencies that satisfy the following criteria:

The coin has a significant market capitalization ($1 billion and up) The coin is listed on many cryptocurrency exchanges and can easily be exchanged against fiat currencies The coin has solid liquidity (at least $100 million in 24-hour trading volume) The coin is already a working product and is not based on future promises

If you stick to coins that meet these criteria, you'll automatically be filtering out a lot of low-quality projects and reducing your chances of falling victim to scams. You will also easily be able to sell your coins and convert them to fiat currency if you ever decide to do so.

Here's a few examples of cryptocurrencies that are worth considering for beginner investors in crypto. These coins have a lot of liquidity, well-developed ecosystems and a lot of educational resources and tools that will help beginners get up to speed.

Bitcoin Ethereum Litecoin Polygon Solana

Please note that cryptocurrencies are risky investments and typically display a lot of price volatility. This is true even for established cryptocurrencies with multi-billion dollar market capitalizations. Never invest more than you are willing to lose.

Best crypto to buy for long-term investors

Many crypto investors prefer to passively hold their cryptocurrencies over the long term instead of actively trading them. Frankly, this is a good decision if you don't want to put a lot of time and effort into following everything that's happening in the crypto and blockchain space.

If you're trying to invest in crypto for the long term, we recommend that you only stick to the most established cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. While they are still risky, their fundamentals are much more robust than projects that heavily depend on just a few developers and community leaders.

In order to invest in crypto successfully over the long term, we recommend that you store your coins safely using a hardware crypto wallet. Although there's plenty of high-quality hardware wallets out there, Ledger's devices stand out as the best choice overall in our opinion.

Get a Ledger Hardware Wallet

How we chose the best cryptocurrencies to buy

With thousands of different cryptocurrencies on the market, it can be challenging to narrow down the list to only about a dozen coins. When creating this list, we aimed to showcase a variety of cryptocurrency projects, ranging from well-established projects to more speculative projects that could potentially have a lot of upside. Here's the factors we considered when deciding which cryptocurrencies to feature.

Availability

It's important for a cryptocurrency to be easily available across a variety of cryptocurrency exchanges, including both centralized and decentralized options. We also considered whether the cryptocurrency can be traded directly against fiat currencies, which makes the process of buying and selling much more straightforward.

Market capitalization

The coins featured on our list of the best cryptocurrencies to buy in 2023 are all among the 100 largest crypto assets by market capitalization. By itself, a large market capitalization doesn't mean that the project is of high quality. However, it is a good indication that there's a lot of community interest in the project, and coins with a larger market cap are more resilient to market manipulation attempts as moving the market requires large amounts of capital.  

Sector leadership

The cryptocurrency market can be divided into several sectors. For example, we have Proof-of-Work cryptocurrencies and Proof-of-Stake cryptocurrencies, which represent two of the main approaches towards achieving decentralized consensus. We can further identify other sectors such as decentralized finance, non-fungible tokens, layer 2 projects, meme coins and others.

We attempted to highlight projects that are leaders in their respective sectors in order to showcase the variety that can be found in the crypto and blockchain space.

Working products

It's important that the cryptocurrency we're featuring has a working product already and isn't simply based on future promises. When it comes to cryptocurrencies, we generally avoid highlighting coins that don't have a working mainnet yet. When it comes to tokens, we try to focus on tokens that are used as utility tokens in a working product or as governance tokens in an actively used decentralized protocol.

Occasionally, we will highlight coins that are about to launch their mainnet or key product soon. However, we try to limit this only to top tier projects that are highly anticipated by the crypto community.

Team and development

Most high-quality crypto and blockchain projects are transparent about their team and their credentials. We prefer to highlight projects developed and managed by highly qualified individuals. In addition, we put a lot of value on activity. If a project is being developed actively, we're much more likely to feature it over a project that is only improved occasionally. 

Of course, a project's team or founders being anonymous is not a dealbreaker in every single case. After all, we still don't know who created Bitcoin.

The bottom line: What crypto to buy now?

What is the best crypto to buy now is mostly dependent on your own individual risk profile and investment goals. If you are interested in cryptocurrencies that have long-term potential, then staples like BTC and ETH are probably the right choice for you. 

If your risk appetite is greater, you can try to pursue investments in cryptos under 1 cent or participate in the latest crypto presales if you are feeling especially frisky. 

In any case, please keep in mind that the cryptocurrency market is highly volatile and that investing in cryptocurrency is subject to considerable risk. Always do your research and consider your financial situation before making any investment, and never invest more than you are willing to lose.