USD Coin (USDC) vs. Tether (USDT)

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US dollar-backed stablecoins USD Coin (USDC) and Tether (USDT) are the two most widely used stablecoins in the world.

We compare USDC versus USDT on key stats like market capitalization, track record and transparency to help you decide on what’s best for your financial goals.

USDC vs. USDT at a glance

Coin symbol	USDC	USDT
Market cap	US$78,902,993,053	US$184,139,417,315
Total supply	78,937,097,379	189,651,886,422
Circulating supply	78,911,567,928	184,184,947,487
Current price	US$0.999854	US$0.999753
All-time high	US$1.04	US$1.32
All-time high date	November 15, 2018	July 24, 2018
Notable team members	Jeremy Allaire, Sean Neville, Brian Armstrong	Brock Pierce, Craig Sellars, Reeve Collins
Partnerships	Visa, Ripio	Tron, OMG Network
Industry	Stablecoins	Stablecoins
Token uses	Stablecoin	Stablecoin
Network	Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, Solana and others	Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, Solana and others

What are stablecoins and what do people use them for?

Stablecoins are digital tokens that aim to maintain a 1:1 ratio with the value of currencies like the US dollar.

These tokenized dollars can be collateralized — or backed — in many ways. USDT and USDC, the two largest stablecoins by market capitalization, are backed with actual US dollars or other reserve assets like US Treasury bills or commercial bonds.

High-frequency traders often use stablecoins. If traders want to exit a position in an asset like Bitcoin (BTC) but don’t necessarily want to move their money back into a bank account, which often takes days, they can park their money in stablecoins before making their next trade.

Some hold stablecoins to earn a yield on them. Stablecoin holders can earn yields on their stablecoins through centralized finance (CeFi) platforms like BlockFi or through decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols like SushiSwap.

Stablecoins are also used as a currency outside of the United States. People use US dollar-backed stablecoins to pay for goods and services in countries like Argentina, which have dollarized due to high inflation in their national currencies.

How do stablecoins work?

USDC vs. USDT fees

The fees associated with using USDC and USDT are not related to the tokens themselves. Instead, the fees for using these tokens have to do with the blockchain on which you use them.

For example, transaction fees on the Ethereum blockchain are typically much higher than the transaction fees on other Layer 1 blockchains like Solana, Binance Smart Chain and Fantom or Layer 2 blockchains like Polygon.
What are Layer 1 and Layer 2 blockchains?

USDC vs. USDT: An issue of trust

USDC has earned a good reputation in the crypto space because its parent company, Circle, is more transparent about the assets that back USDC than Tether is with USDT.

	USDC	USDT
Audit frequency	Yearly	N/A
Attestation frequency	Monthly	Quarterly
Reserve backing	US dollars, Treasury Bills	US dollars, Treasury Bills, corporate bonds

USDC’s transparency

USDC was created to provide the crypto market with a US dollar-backed stablecoin like USDT but with more transparent backing.

Stablecoin users didn’t trust that USDT was fully collateralized because, at the time, Tether’s reserves had never been audited. In other words, Tether had been less than forward regarding its finances, and Circle believed that the market needed a stablecoin that investors could trust.

USDC’s reserves have been audited annually by outside accounting firms since the asset’s inception. As of March 2026, Circle (the issuer of USDC) publishes monthly, independent reserve attestations verified by Deloitte.

Reports show that USDC is backed only by actual US dollars and US Treasury Bills.

USDT’s lack of transparency

Tether has been notorious for not disclosing the assets it holds to collateralize USDT. In December 2021, Tether proved that about 44% of its reserves were in US Treasury Bills, and as of May 2021, only 3% of its reserves were in US dollars.

The rest of its reserves are described as holdings of “unspecified commercial paper,” or short-term debt issued by companies. It’s also added that it doesn’t want to disclose the type of commercial paper it holds because it doesn’t want to give away its “secret sauce.”

Some fear that Tether poses a systemic risk to crypto markets. For example, professors at the University of Texas found in 2018 that USDT tokens had been minted — without necessarily being properly collateralized — to buy Bitcoin as a means to prop up its price.

However, Tether recently announced that it is hiring a “Big Four” auditing firm to conduct its first full financial statement audit.

Tether has also had its fair share of legal issues:

• New York State sued Tether in April 2019, alleging that it attempted to cover up an $850 million loss.
• Bitfinex, a crypto exchange owned by the same company that owns Tether — iFinex — was rumored to have lent Tether money to cover up the losses.
• In 2019, the New York Supreme Court found that Tether (USDT) was only 74% backed, and New York State has prohibited Tether from doing business within its borders. Tether settled the lawsuit by paying a fine of $18.5 million.

Is Tether’s lack of transparency really an issue?

Despite the controversy surrounding USDT, Tether has never failed to process a redemption for an actual US dollar.

If there were a run on Tether, however unlikely, it would mean that not everyone holding USDT tokens would be able to redeem them for actual US dollars.

Bottom line

Whether you’re parking your money in USDT or USDC between trades, lending your stablecoins to generate yield or using them as a medium of exchange, make sure you’ve considered each asset’s track record of transparency and accountability first.

Frequently asked questions

• Is USDC safer than Tether?

  Yes, USDC is generally considered safer. USDC is widely viewed as the more transparent option, thanks to regular audits and simpler reserve structures, while Tether has faced questions around transparency and was fined $41 million in 2021 for misleading users about its reserves. USDC is issued by a US-based company and is fully compliant with the new GENIUS Act stablecoin framework, whereas Tether is issued offshore and is not yet fully compliant.

• Which is better: USDT or USDC?

  USDC is the better vehicle for capital preservation and any activity touching regulated financial infrastructure, while USDT remains the better tool for active trading due to deeper liquidity and larger market share on exchanges. The practical advice: many investors split between both — USDT for trading, USDC for savings and long-term holds.

• Is USDC cheaper than USDT?

  Most of the time, both stablecoins maintain their 1:1 peg to the US dollar. You can compare the current price of USDC versus USDT in our table.

  In volatile periods in the market, you might see the price of USDC or USDT rise and fall slightly on either side of one US dollar. In rare cases, the coins have fallen 15-25% from their pegs, but the fluctuations have been relatively short-lived.