What is Ethereum Classic (ETC)?
Ethereum Classic (ETC) is the blockchain that preserved the original Ethereum ledger after a divisive hard fork in 2016. It prioritises immutability, continues to use proof-of-work mining, and supports smart contracts compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
The birth of ETC: The DAO fork and the "Code is Law" stance
In 2016, a smart contract vulnerability in "The DAO", an early decentralised fund built on Ethereum, was exploited, resulting in a large theft. The majority of the Ethereum community decided to implement a hard fork that rewound the chain to refund the stolen funds — this chain evolved into today’s Ethereum (ETH). A dissenting faction, however, rejected altering the ledger on principle and kept running the untouched original chain. This group upheld the notion that blockchain rules must be absolute, giving rise to Ethereum Classic.
This split shaped ETC’s identity as a network that values code enforcement without human intervention. For its supporters, the idea that "code is law" is more important than any practical aftermath.
How the ETC network runs and what its token is used for
Ethereum Classic relies on proof-of-work (PoW): miners compete to validate transactions, secure the network, and earn ETC block rewards. When Ethereum transitioned to proof-of-stake, ETC remained PoW, making it one of the few major EVM-compatible chains still backed by mining.
ETC tokens serve as gas for transactions and smart contract executions, reward miners, and act as the native asset for dApps on the network. The protocol enforces a fixed supply capped at about 210.7 million coins, with block reward reductions programmed every 5 million blocks. This deflationary-like schedule echoes Bitcoin’s approach and gives ETC a predictable issuance curve.
Because ETC’s mining hash rate has historically been lower than that of larger PoW chains, the network has experienced several 51% attacks. In response, it adopted mechanisms such as MESS (Modified Exponential Subjective Scoring) that increase the cost of rewriting recent blocks, bolstering transaction finality.