**What's driving Bitcoin adoption in 2026?** https://stacker.news/items/1442050

0xbitcoiner

This slides are part of latest River Intelligence report about 

There is no bear market in bitcoin adoption

Trust in bitcoin has grown faster than that of any asset in history. What began as an experiment is now a globally recognized store-of-value, with adoption patterns that rival the internet.

Bitcoin is now held by millions of individuals, thousands of businesses, and several dozen governments around the world. This report examines the key Bitcoin adoption trends over the past year.

We show that even in a period when bitcoin's price declined, adoption continued to accelerate.

bitcoin

This slides are part of latest River Intelligence report about [What's driving Bitcoin and Lightning adoption in 2026](https://river.com/learn/files/river-bitcoin-adoption-report-2026.pdf).

Continue reading the report for [Businesses and Merchants](https://stacker.news/items/1448158/r/supratic)

Continue reading the [report for Lightning](https://stacker.news/items/1448155/r/supratic)


## There is no bear market in bitcoin adoption
Trust in bitcoin has grown faster than that of any asset in history. What began as an experiment is now a globally recognized store-of-value, with adoption patterns that rival the internet.
Bitcoin is now held by millions of individuals, thousands of businesses, and several dozen governments around the world. This report examines the key Bitcoin adoption trends over the past year.
We show that even in a period when bitcoin's price declined, adoption continued to accelerate.

![The Bitcoin network: nodes and hashrate - Bitcoin operates on a decentralized network of nodes and miners. By most metrics, the health of the Bitcoin network is more robust than ever. It consists of roughly 24,700 reachable nodes, growing by 14% in 2025. The Bitcoin network is now secured by more than 1 zetahash of computational power, meaning every second there are over 1 sextillion computations being done to secure the network. Miner hashrate has grown by an average of 108% per year since 2016, with 35% growth in 2025.](https://m.stacker.news/133064)

![Hashrate distribution is an important indicator of Bitcoin's network health. Centralization of hashrate increases the risk of threats like censorship or spending a transaction twice. From a geographic perspective, bitcoin mining has never been more decentralized. Private enterprises have built mines across dozens of countries: • 34 countries > 0.1% of total hashrate (+8 in 2025) • 12 countries > 1% of hashrate (+3 in 2025). Mining pools are Bitcoin's largest point of centralization. The top 3 pools have lost 12% market share over the past two years as more hashrate has spread across other pools in the top 10.](https://m.stacker.news/133065)


![Year 5 of over $1 trillion in value transferre - While the Bitcoin blockchain is not designed for everyday payments, it is a reliable way to settle high-value transactions at low costs. Bitcoin's value transferred in 2025 was 24% of Visa's annual card volume, but remains a small fraction of other large-value payment systems. Fedwire, for example, processed $1.15 quadrillion in value in 2025, or 300X that of Bitcoin.](https://m.stacker.news/133066)

![Bitcoin Ownership Distribution](https://m.stacker.news/133067)

![Individual Bitcoin ownership picked since 2024](https://m.stacker.news/133068)

![Institutions may own majority of Bitcoin within a decade](https://m.stacker.news/133069)

![Bitcoin now mainstream on Wall St.](https://m.stacker.news/133070)

![Notable institutions allocated capital to bitcoin](https://m.stacker.news/133071)

![2025's record year for business bitcoin investment](https://m.stacker.news/133073)

![Treasury companies](https://m.stacker.news/133074)

![Bitcoin adoption by public companies](https://m.stacker.news/133075)


![Nation-state estimated to own bitcoin](https://m.stacker.news/133084)

![Regulatory changes in bitcoin since 2020](https://m.stacker.news/133085)

![Bitcoin is now a central bank reserve asset - In 2025, the Czech National Bank became the first central bank to add bitcoin to its reserve assets. The move comes as the U.S. dollar's role as the world's primary reserve asset is increasingly being questioned. In this context, bitcoin is no longer a speculative experiment but a serious candidate for central bank reserves. It now has deep global liquidity, a large and durable market capitalization, declining long-term volatility, proven decentralization, and a 16-year operating history. Together, these characteristics make it increasingly credible as a reserve asset for any institution.](https://m.stacker.news/133086)

![Bitcoin has drawn over 700+ Billions in investments since 2022](https://m.stacker.news/133087)

![Bitcoin is now 1.2% of global money](https://m.stacker.news/133089)

![Conclusion - Like all forms of money, bitcoin is ultimately built on trust. Each year, Bitcoin continues to reliably operate as the world's only scarce and incorruptible form of digital money. It is steadily deepening trust from individuals, businesses, institutions, and nation-states alike. We expect that in the coming years, bitcoin adoption will not only continue its current trend, but meaningfully accelerate. This expectation is founded in the Bitcoin network's unprecedented reliability and resilience, regardless of market conditions.](https://m.stacker.news/133090)

There is no bear market in bitcoin adoptionThere is no bear market in bitcoin adoption