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Grin is an anonymous privacy-oriented cryptocurrency. Unlike bitcoin, its transactions are truly anonymous — without any visible wallet addresses or transaction amounts.
The reason some people regard Grin as one of the most likely successors to bitcoin’s legacy is that it shares similarities with bitcoin that almost no other cryptocurrency does.
This is your complete guide to Grin, what makes it different and where you can buy it.
This is our quick guide to just one way of buying GRIN. Compare some other options in the table below.
At the time of writing, you can only buy GRIN with bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH) or Tether (USDT). You cannot yet buy it directly with fiat currency, such as USD.
If you want to sell GRIN, the process for doing so is the same as buying, except you reverse the coins that you’re buying and selling.
To sell it, you can exchange it for BTC, ETH or USDT, as well as any other trading pairs that become available.
Grin is a privacy cryptocurrency based on the Mimblewimble protocol.
| Ticker symbol | GRIN |
|---|---|
| Use | Private and anonymous cryptocurrency transactions |
| Year released | 2019 |
| Origin | Unknown |
| Maximum supply | Unlimited |
| Consensus algorithm | Proof of Work (Cuckoo Cycle) |
| Notable team members | Unknown |
| Notable partnerships | - |
| Mineable? | Yes |
A privacy cryptocurrency allows anonymous transactions without revealing the sending or receiving addresses. Monero, for example, helps to conceal the addresses of the sender and receiver by seeding a transaction with decoys, while Zcash conceals addresses and allows for optional shielding of transaction values.
But in Grin’s case, it doesn’t even show the transaction amounts or the sender or receiver addresses. It aims to be the most private and anonymous cryptocurrency ever made.
However, achieving true and effective privacy on a public decentralized cryptocurrency is extremely technically challenging.
Grin achieves this level of privacy with something called the Mimblewimble protocol. It’s one of the only cryptocurrencies in existence to use this protocol.
Mimblewimble is a design for private cryptocurrency transactions. It’s a pre-assembled framework of several key features, which have been put together in a way that makes them compatible with each other.
Each of these features was individually developed and refined over time before being combined in Mimblewimble.
To create a GRIN wallet you’ll first need to set up a node. This is slightly more complicated than what you might be used to with other cryptocurrencies.
This is firstly because Grin is still in its early stages of development and secondly because its unique privacy features come with some added complexity.
Detailed instructions for setting up a GRIN wallet are beyond the scope of this guide, but the general steps are to:
Currently, Grin is largely geared towards more technically-inclined users. But over time, as more developers work on it, it’s likely to get easier to use.
Due to its nature, with hidden transaction numbers and amounts, sending and receiving GRIN is currently more difficult than other cryptocurrencies.
You will need to run a Grin node and wallet to make GRIN transactions.
With the node, there are three ways to identify the recipient of the funds and send them money.
In all cases, the receiving wallet’s node will need to run the “listener.” This essentially “listens” for incoming transactions.
Its use of the Mimblewimble privacy protocol is what sets Grin apart.
Two cryptocurrencies quickly emerged and started building on top of Mimblewimble. One of them is Beam and the other is Grin.
One of the main differences between them is that Beam is a corporate venture while Grin is the result of volunteer developers, many of whom have adopted their own Harry Potter-esque pseudonyms in tribute to the original Mimblewimble creator.
The technical foundations of Grin, the very real privacy problems it aims to solve, its incorporation of solutions initially proposed for bitcoin, its anonymous volunteer team and its general vibe have many pegging it as bitcoin’s spiritual successor.
Grin has also set itself apart with some technical differences. For example, it uses the Cuckoo Cycle proof of work mining algorithm while Beam has opted for Equihash.
Cuckoo Cycle is a memory-bound proof of work system that wants to help level the playing field for cryptocurrency miners. It does this by introducing artificial bottlenecks in the memory of mining machines.
The result is that Grin aims to have much more egalitarian mining than Beam does.
Disclosure: At the time of writing, the author holds ETH.
