What the estimates say
| Source | Estimate | When and how |
|---|---|---|
| Crypto.com, Crypto Market Sizing 2025 | 365 million hold bitcoin (of 741 million crypto owners) | February 2026. Modelled from on-chain data and exchange records; counts owners, not addresses |
| Crypto.com, Crypto Market Sizing Report 2024 | 337 million hold bitcoin (of 659 million crypto owners) | January 2025. The same model a year earlier |
| Triple-A, Cryptocurrency Ownership Data | Over 560 million crypto owners, 6.8% of the world | 2024. Country surveys and statistics, combined; bitcoin alone is not separated |
| Pew Research Center | 17% of US adults have ever invested in, traded or used a cryptocurrency | Survey of February 2024. Telephone-and-web survey of 10,133 US adults |
| Federal Reserve, Economic Well-Being of US Households | 8% of US adults held or used crypto in 2024, 10% in 2025 | Reports of May 2025 and May 2026. Annual survey of about 12,000 US adults |
Why they differ
Addresses are not people. A person can use dozens of addresses; an exchange can hold millions of customers' coins in a few. So on-chain counts (the billions of addresses ever used) set a ceiling, not a headcount, and estimates of owners always add assumptions about how many people sit behind each address and exchange account.
Surveys count people but only in the countries asked. The US figures above are solid for the US; there is no comparable worldwide survey, so global numbers extrapolate from a handful of national studies.
The range is wide on purpose. Published estimates for bitcoin owners run from around 100 million to over 360 million, depending on who counts and how: read any single number as the middle of a range, not a census.
Where that sits on the internet's curve
Set the estimates on the curve the internet actually travelled and the picture is simple: at the end of 2025, on Crypto.com's figures, about 9% of the world's people owned crypto, the share the internet reached between 2001 and 2002. From there, internet use took about five more years to double and another decade or so to reach half the world.
Crypto owners are not internet users, and nothing says crypto has to follow this path: the point of the chart is the scale of the gap, not a date for closing it.
| End of year | Crypto owners | Bitcoin owners | Crypto, % of world | Internet, % of world |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 295 million | not published | 3.7% | 63.8% |
| 2022 | 425 million | 219 million | 5.3% | 67.0% |
| 2023 | 580 million | 296 million | 7.2% | 69.2% |
| 2024 | 659 million | 337 million | 8.1% | 71.2% |
| 2025 | 741 million | 365 million | 9.0% | 73.6% |
Internet share: International Telecommunication Union data through the World Bank (CC BY 4.0), the world row from 2005; 2000 to 2004 are our population-weighted combination of the continents in the same data, from Our World in Data. Owners: Crypto.com's reports for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025. World population: World Bank SP.POP.TOTL. Crypto.com revises its model between editions, so differences between years may partly be method.
How this page is put together
The estimates in the table are copied from each publisher's own page; the link goes to it. We have not altered or averaged them. Our own figure is the free Addresses count chart: the number of Bitcoin addresses that have ever received bitcoin, computed from every block by our own node.
The internet comparison above is a measured line with published dots on it: no logistic is fitted. Five estimates from one publisher cannot carry a curve fit or a forecast, so we draw neither.
Questions
How many people own bitcoin?
Nobody knows exactly. The latest published estimate, from Crypto.com for 2025, is 365 million owners worldwide, but other published figures range from around 100 million up; the sources and methods are listed on this page.
How many bitcoin addresses are there?
1.56 billion addresses have ever received bitcoin, counted from every block by our own node. Many are empty now, and they are not people.
How many Americans own crypto?
In the Federal Reserve's annual survey 8% of US adults held or used crypto in 2024 and 10% in 2025; in Pew's February 2024 survey 17% said they had ever invested in, traded or used it.
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Figures on this page are calculated by CryptoKeyhole from our own Bitcoin node and the price data we collect, and refreshed automatically; estimates say how they are made. Nothing here is investment advice.