The study by cryptocurrency experts Marketplace Fairness analyzed Google searches worldwide for a number of Bitcoin alternative cryptocurrencies to see which were the most popular worldwide in 2023.

It found that Ethereum is currently leading all Bitcoin alternatives in popularity, with 3,260,000 searches for the currency worldwide every month. It was founded in 2015, over five years after Bitcoin, and is proving to be more popular globally than some of its older counterparts.

Dogecoin comes in second place on the list as the most popular ‘Meme coin’ worldwide, with 1,659,000 monthly searches for it. The currency has been rising recently, having seen a mention in Walter Isaacson’s newly released Elon Musk biography.

XRP comes in third place, with cryptocurrency seeing around 1,250,000 searches for it each month worldwide. It’s the native cryptocurrency of the Ripple network and was launched in 2012, making it one of the older entries on the list.

Coming in fourth place is another ‘Meme coin’ in Shiba Inu, which attracts around 678,000 searches worldwide. It was founded in August 2020 and saw its peak price in October 2021, when its value rose by a whopping 240% in a week.

Rounding out the top five very close behind is Cardano, with 677,000 searches a month worldwide. The fully open-source currency was founded in 2017 as a result of a crowdfunding campaign. 

Rank     Currency     Global searches a month

1         Ethereum        3,260,000

2         Dogecoin        1,659,000

3         XRP                1,250,000

4        Shiba Inu         678,000

5        Cardano          677,000

6        Solana            542,000

7        EOS               329,200

8        Litecoin          328,000

9        Tether            193,000

10      Polkadot        183,000

Commenting on the findings, a spokesperson for Marketplace Fairness said: “While Bitcoin is arguably the poster boy of crypto, there are still such a broad range of cryptocurrencies around, many of which are on the rise. ‘Meme coins’ like Dogecoin can often be fairly volatile in the market, so it’ll be interesting to see how the global popularity of these currencies compares to their value as the crypto world changes.”