For most cryptos, including meme coins, the winter of 2022 proved to be a somewhat difficult year. Despite this, the popularity of some contenders in the meme coin sector remained unaffected. This was especially seen for both the top dog-themed coins- DOGE and SHIB.
Both SHIB and DOGE share similar faces and have been inspired by one of the most famous Internet memes of the 2010s— the Japanese “doge” Shiba Inu dog. Interestingly, it seems the huge popularity of these two meme coins has somewhat resulted in an influx of new meme currencies that keep popping up in the meme coin world.
Today, Meme coins are more popular than ever and have led many people into a dilemma over which to choose amongst the two title holders in the meme coin sector. In this article, we will explore the significant distinctions between Shiba Inu and Dogecoin.
Considered the first and original memecoin, Doge was created as a joke in the crypto world. The story goes on that when its two creators- software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer felt Bitcoin to be too complicated for any average user they launched Doge as a response in 2013 to make fun of it. However, despite that, it seemed to have struck a chord with crypto users and much to the founders’ surprise, it took no time for the currency to attain viral status.
It is no secret that the CEO of Tesla Motors, Elon Musk has had a hand in it going viral with occasional tweets and endorsements. Much like Bitcoin, Dogecoin is based on a public, distributed ledger called the blockchain.
What makes the memecoin unique is that it uses inflation and is community-based. Also, unlike Bitcoin, Doge is infinitely circulating.
With a Japanese Shiba Inu dog as its logo, Dogecoin is known for its humour in the crypto world.
Due to its one-minute transaction processing per block, it is suitable for daily use.
It has low transaction fees and high supply, making it popular for micro transactions.
Dogecoin is known to have a very supportive community that has helped the coin’s charitable side shine through despite its satirical origins.
Introduced in 2020, Shiba Inu was created as a parody of Dogecoin, referring to itself as ‘the Dogecoin killer.’
However, despite its late debut, it took very little time for the coin to gain immediate popularity and become viral. In mid-2021, Shiba Inu had for a brief period even managed to overshadow Dogecoin. Unlike Dogecoin, which employs blockchain technology, Shiba Inu’s anonymous creator or group ‘Ryoshi’, chose to use an Ethereum blockchain, as an Ethereum-based alternative to Dogecoin.
Shiba Inu is one of the top ERC-20 tokens that runs on the Ethereum blockchain. The platform’s reduction design causes a portion of each transaction to be burned, resulting in a decrease of available supply.
Shiba Inu is a community-based project that is decentralized and transparent.
Each transaction in the platform burns a portion of the token’s supply, deflating its supply.
The meme currency uses Ethereum’s smart contracts to add new applications to its ecosystem.
Shiba Inu just so happens to be one small component of a bigger ecosystem that also includes- Shibarium, ShibSwap, Shiboshis, and the Shib Metaverse.
Though Dogecoin inspired the development of Shiba Inu, and funnily enough both share the same dog breed face of a Shiba dog, there are however still certain aspects that differentiate both the memecoins from each other.
1. Development
In 2013, Dogecoin was created using Bitcoin Technology and just like the latter currency deployed a ‘proof-of-work’ (PoW) mining method. Shiba Inu Coin on the other hand was created in 2020 using the Ethereum Network and deployed ‘proof-of-stake’ (PoS) technology.
Unlike Dogecoin which has its blockchain, Shiba Inu employs the Ethereum blockchain network.
2. Market capitalization
As of September 2023, Dogecoin’s market cap was USD 9,507,711,042, compared to USD 4,714,605,984 for Shiba Inu Coins. Also, Shiba Inu’s current worth was USD 0.000008, while, Dogecoin was at USD 0.68.
3. Coin Supply
Though Dogecoin has a limitless supply, it only allows its users to issue 5 billion coins annually.
On the contrary, Shiba Inu permits up to 1 quadrillion, which going by crypto standards is still a sizable amount.
The risks and concerns involving both Dogecoin and Shiba Inu are very similar since they are both meme coins.
The first thing to note is that unlike some other coins in the market that allow users to borrow, lend, or earn interest on their assets, these meme coins lack in that aspect.
Secondly, for both currencies, top holders hold a significant amount of the supply.
In Doge, nearly 50% of all the tokens are held by the top 20 addresses, while for Shib the figure is closer to 75%.
As both Dogecoin and Shiba Inu were built on hype, investing in them does carry some risks. Users should be aware before deciding to use any of them. Despite everything, there is no question that both coins hold important status in the crypto world.
Also Read: Pepecoin Investment Consideration: Predictions & Insights
