What is Ethereum Classic? The 2016 split and its proof of work

Ethereum Classic (ETC) is the continuation of the original Ethereum blockchain, which kept running unchanged after the DAO hack of 2016. When most Ethereum developers reversed the consequences of the hack through a hard fork in July 2016, a minority stayed with the old blockchain. That became Ethereum Classic: a smart contract network that is still secured by proof of work, has a fixed maximum supply of 210.7 million ETC and cuts the reward for miners by a fifth every five million blocks.

That makes ETC a special case for investors. The coin carries the name of the second-largest crypto network but works differently from Ethereum in key respects. On Sunday morning, November 15, one Ethereum Classic cost about €5.34, according to CoinGecko. Anyone looking to buy the coin will find ETC/euro pairs on several regulated trading venues. This profile explains its origins, technology, monetary policy and risks.

Ethereum Classic explained: the original Ethereum blockchain

Ethereum Classic is a public blockchain with its own cryptocurrency, ETC. Its first block, the genesis block, is the same as Ethereum's: July 30, 2015. Up to block 1,919,999, the two networks therefore share a common history. They only run separately from block 1,920,000.

A smart contract is a program that sits on the blockchain and executes itself as soon as its conditions are met. Ethereum Classic can run such programs just like Ethereum, because both use the same virtual machine, the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). The difference lies in three choices Ethereum Classic made differently:

• Immutability: transactions are not rewritten after the fact, not even after a theft. The community sums this up in the phrase "code is law".
• Proof of work: miners secure the network with computing power. Ethereum, by contrast, switched to proof of stake in September 2022.
• Fixed money supply: the issuance of new coins follows a fixed schedule with a cap, similar to bitcoin.

The DAO hack of 2016: why Ethereum and Ethereum Classic split

The DAO was a decentralized investment fund on Ethereum in 2016: a smart contract into which investors paid ether and through which they were meant to vote on projects. In June 2016, an attacker exploited a flaw in the code and drained a large part of the deposited ether into a sub-contract of his own. Because the funds initially stayed locked there, the Ethereum community had time for a decision of principle.

The majority, backed by the Ethereum Foundation, opted for a hard fork. That is a change to the protocol rules that is no longer compatible with the old software: anyone who does not update ends up on a separate blockchain. The fork took effect on July 20, 2016, at block 1,920,000 and moved the affected ether to a refund contract. Those who rejected the intervention kept running the old blockchain. Exchanges listed it shortly afterwards under the name Ethereum Classic. What happens to your coins in such a split, and how soft forks and hard forks differ, is explained in our piece on hard forks and soft forks.

Anyone who held ether before the fork held the same balance on both blockchains afterwards: once as ETH and once as ETC. The split thus demonstrated a process that later recurred with Bitcoin Cash and other forks.

Proof of work on ETC: how ETChash and mining secure the network

Proof of work, or PoW, is a consensus mechanism in which computers race to solve cryptographic puzzles. Whoever first finds a valid solution may add the next block and receives newly created coins and the transaction fees in return. Attacking the blockchain becomes expensive, because the attacker would need more computing power than all honest miners combined.

Ethereum Classic uses the ETChash algorithm for this. It was introduced with the Thanos upgrade (ECIP-1099), which went live at block 11,700,000 at the end of November 2020. Thanos doubled the length of an epoch from 30,000 to 60,000 blocks. As a result, the DAG, a large dataset held in graphics memory, grows only half as fast. Graphics cards with 3 or 4 gigabytes of memory could then mine again, which was meant to increase the number of potential miners. The technical rationale is set out in improvement proposal ECIP-1099.

Today a large share of the computing power comes from specialized mining devices, known as ASICs, and from mining pools. A new block is produced on average every 13 to 14 seconds: between October 30 and November 15, 2026, 100,000 blocks were added, which works out at about 13.5 seconds per block. Why Ethereum itself has not been mined since the Merge, and what former Ethereum miners do instead, is covered in our guide to Ethereum mining after the Merge.

Smart contracts on the EVM: what runs on Ethereum Classic

Because Ethereum Classic uses the Ethereum Virtual Machine, the same programming languages and tools run there as on Ethereum, above all Solidity. A developer can deploy a contract on both networks with only a few adjustments. Wallets such as MetaMask can connect to Ethereum Classic once you add the network with its chain ID 61.

To stay compatible with Ethereum, Ethereum Classic has adopted several Ethereum upgrades in its own hard forks. Mystique brought features from Ethereum's London upgrade in February 2022, and Spiral brought the changes from the Shanghai upgrade in February 2024 at block 19,250,000. The fee burn that Ethereum introduced in 2021 with EIP-1559, however, does not exist on Ethereum Classic. Fees go entirely to miners.

The ecosystem is much smaller than Ethereum's. There are decentralized applications (dApps), decentralized exchanges, bridges to other blockchains and some tokens, but hardly any application that exists only on Ethereum Classic. Most users hold ETC as a coin and rarely use the network for complex applications.

Ethereum Classic vs Ethereum: consensus, supply and fees compared

Both networks share their origins and technology but have drifted far apart since 2016. The main differences at a glance:

On balance, ETC is the more conservative network: fewer changes, a fixed money supply, no staking. Ethereum is by far the more active network, with more applications, more developers and more capital. Comparing ETC with bitcoin reveals the closer kinship: proof of work and a capped supply link ETC more strongly to bitcoin than to today's Ethereum.

Monetary policy under ECIP-1017: how the 5M20 rule caps the ETC supply

Ethereum Classic's monetary policy is laid down in improvement proposal ECIP-1017, in force since the end of 2017. The rule is called 5M20: every 5 million blocks a new era begins and the block reward falls by 20 percent. Bitcoin's reward halves at each halving, whereas ETC's falls in smaller steps. In the community this step is therefore known as the "fifthening".

The most recent cut came on July 22, 2026, with block 25,000,000. Since then the block reward has been 1.6384 ETC per block. On November 15 the blockchain stood at block 25,736,530. That leaves just over 4.26 million blocks until the next cut at block 30,000,000. At 13.5 seconds per block, that takes about 667 days. At the current pace, the next cut to 1.31 ETC will therefore fall in September 2028.

Ongoing issuance can be calculated as well. At around 6,400 blocks a day, about 10,500 new ETC are created daily, or roughly 3.8 million a year. Measured against 159 million coins in circulation, that is annual inflation of about 2.4 percent, which falls further with each era. Around 75 percent of the maximum supply of 210.7 million ETC has thus already been issued.

51 percent attacks in 2020: the biggest security risk for a small proof-of-work blockchain

A 51 percent attack occurs when someone controls more than half of a network's computing power. The attacker can then build a separate, longer version of the blockchain and replace transactions that have already been confirmed. That makes it possible to spend coins twice: the attacker deposits at an exchange, sells, withdraws and then makes the deposit disappear from the blockchain.

Ethereum Classic has experienced this several times. In August 2020, the blockchain was rewritten three times within a month, in the largest incident at the end of August by more than 7,000 blocks. In the second attack in early August, ETC worth about $5.6 million was double-spent, according to an analysis by the data service Bitquery, as Cointelegraph reported. Several exchanges then increased the number of confirmations they wait for on ETC deposits.

The underlying problem remains: the less computing power a proof-of-work network has, the cheaper it is to rent a majority for a short time. Since the Ethereum Merge in 2022, ETC has been the largest network in the Ethash family and has gained more miners as a result, but it remains far behind bitcoin. In practice, deposits to exchanges often take longer for ETC, because platforms require more confirmations than for large networks.

ETC price and market capitalization: 96 percent below the 2021 record

On November 15, 2026, one ETC cost about €5.34, or $5.89, according to CoinGecko. Market capitalization was about €850 million, which ranked 72nd among cryptocurrencies. Trading volume across all exchanges was about $39 million over 24 hours. ETC lost about 14 percent in a week and about 61 percent over a year. The entire crypto market has been under pressure since mid-November.

The record high dates from May 6, 2021, at $167.09. Measured against that, the price is just over 96 percent lower. Market capitalization is the number of coins in circulation multiplied by the price. Just over 159 million ETC are in circulation, and because the maximum supply is fixed, this amount now grows only slowly. Our buying analysis of Ethereum Classic assesses whether ETC is attractive at its current level. The analysis does not replace your own due diligence, and this profile does not make a price forecast.

Buying and storing ETC in Germany: euro trading venues and wallets

ETC can be traded directly against the euro. Euro pairs are offered by Bitvavo, Kraken and Bitstamp, among others. By far the largest ETC volume is on Binance, mainly against stablecoins such as USDT. For investors in Germany, supervision matters as much as fees: since the EU's MiCA crypto regulation, providers need a licence to offer crypto services in the EU. Our comparison of regulated crypto exchanges shows which platforms hold such a licence.

ETC wallet addresses look like Ethereum addresses and start with 0x. That is the source of a typical mistake: sending ETC to an address intended only for ETH, or choosing the wrong network when sending, can mean losing the coins or needing the exchange's support to get them back. Before every withdrawal, check that the destination and the network match Ethereum Classic, and send a small test amount first to any new address.

For self-custody, many software and hardware wallets support ETC. Anyone holding larger amounts for the long term uses a hardware wallet and keeps the seed phrase offline. There are no staking yields on ETC, because the network runs on proof of work. Offers advertising "ETC staking" are in fact lending or savings products from a provider and carry that provider's default risk.

Ethereum Classic: next block reward cut not until 2028

Ethereum Classic is not an outdated Ethereum but a network in its own right with a clear line: an immutable blockchain, proof of work and a fixed money supply of 210.7 million ETC. The block reward has stood at 1.6384 ETC since July 2026 and, at the current pace, will not fall again until September 2028. Against that stand a small ecosystem, a price far below its record and the experience of the 51 percent attacks of 2020.

1. Choose a trading venue: compare fees, euro pairs and MiCA licences in our crypto exchange comparison before you buy ETC.
2. Sort out custody: for larger amounts, a wallet of your own is the right choice. Our hardware wallet comparison shows which devices support ETC.

(As of November 15, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)