If you are familiar with the concept of cryptocurrencies, then you might have come across a term forking. You must have known a lot about Bitcoin, including the journey to becoming a successful cryptocurrency around the world and other important facts. Then you must be knowing about the two important forks, one is Bitcoin gold, and the other one is Bitcoin Cash. If not, then better understand the forking impact on Bitcoin.
The possibility of forking occurs when there is more expectation about options other than Bitcoin by the miners. The forking impact on Bitcoin can be noticed during the split of chains on which Bitcoin works, leading on to separate direction and rules. Change of block size by Bitcoin Cash. This indicates the increased size of blocks than the Bitcoin blocks, which is limited to 1 MB. When the existing rules of Bitcoin are not acceptable to the miners, then it leads to splitting of blockchains having separate rules.
What Is Soft Fork And Hard Fork In Blockchain?
While discussing the forking impact on Bitcoin, it is essential to understand the two types of forking, let’s know difference between soft fork and hard fork. Well, let’s start with the first fork, which is a hard fork. In simple words, the permanent divergence in blockchain can be explained as a hard fork. When it happens, the old Bitcoin blockchain gets replaced by the updated version of the new Bitcoin blockchain. The emergence of hard fork implies about the validation of new blocks through new nodes upgraded by miners and users.
Now it becomes a mandatory step as when non-upgraded nodes reject blocks created by upgraded nodes. Now let us move on to soft fork, the other part of forking. In this type of fork, there are only changes in protocol. There is no change in working of old blockchain rules. Bitcoin can continue to work on it.
If you are not abreast with Bitcoin news today, then let us inform you that in August 2017, when the forking happened, Bitcoin Cash got credited to the account of Bitcoin holders. However, Bitcoin Cash was not much provided by the Bitcoin exchanges as it was time-consuming for its implementation. When the forking appeared in October, Bitcoin gold was not credited to most of the users. Both these new digital currencies were different in their price and size. This is another example showing the forking impact on Bitcoin.
At the time of Bitcoin gold hard fork, individuals who even though having the Bitcoin was not credited with Bitcoin gold during the hard fork. Bitcoin Cash seems to be a good deal over Bitcoin in terms of price. However, it is yet to gain complete traction. The issue of forking has caused differences between the crypto service providers and miners. The forking impact on Bitcoin has gone to that stage, where most of the Bitcoin miners have become reluctant to increase the block size. A majority of miners must agree upon the consensus to make forking successful.
Conclusion
So now you must have understood the forking impact on Bitcoin. But more than that you understood about the two types of forks, which is a hard fork and soft fork. Study of forking is also an important angle attached to blockchain. The splitting of blockchain in two different theories and the emergence of new cryptos indicates forking. The best example is Bitcoin Cash that got split from Bitcoin blockchain, where one remained the original Bitcoin, and others came out like Bitcoin Cash inheriting updated quality to the older Bitcoin. This is the result of forking on Bitcoin that bring out a new version of Bitcoin.