Global Bitcoin Interest Index Ranking by Country: European Nations Take 7 of the Top 10 Spots

Text: Bitcoin Magazine

Translation: Felix, PANews

The Bitcoin Popularity Index (BPI) is the first comprehensive search study of its kind. Designed to measure Bitcoin’s global influence through extensive analysis of Google search queries.

Unlike many studies that provide absolute data or examine multiple tokens across various dimensions, BPI data primarily considers factors such as linguistic diversity, Google Chrome's market dominance, and population size, offering specific insights into interest in Bitcoin. This approach not only measures raw interest in Bitcoin across different countries but also gauges engagement levels with Bitcoin.

While the BPI does not aim to deliver definitive answers, by integrating these diverse elements, it offers a unique perspective—shifting from generic metrics to providing a richer, more contextual understanding of Bitcoin adoption worldwide.

Bitcoin Popularity Index 2024

Key Findings

• The United States has the highest number of monthly searches at 14,432,650, followed closely by Brazil with 12,400,260. Germany, India, and Turkey round out the top five.

• Seven of the top ten spots—and eight within the top ten—are occupied by Western European nations.

• The average BPI for "Western" countries globally is approximately 3,720 (compared to 1,250 elsewhere), indicating relatively higher popularity of Bitcoin.

• Africa has the lowest BPI score among all continents, possibly due to Africa’s internet penetration rate being only 40%.

• The most common Bitcoin-related search queries are about price, typically Bitcoin against the U.S. dollar. However, in Egypt, Bitcoin is more frequently priced in gold bars rather than U.S. dollars or Egyptian pounds.

• Total monthly Bitcoin-related search queries approach 77 million, with nearly 10 million directly searching for “Bitcoin.”

• The search ratio between Bitcoin and Ethereum is 9:1.

Continental Comparison

Oceania has the highest average BPI at approximately 4,901, indicating strong popularity of Bitcoin in the region. This figure is based on just two countries—New Zealand and Australia—both benefiting from high internet penetration rates.

Europe follows closely behind, with an average BPI of 3,719 across 41 countries, showing far greater popularity of Bitcoin across the continent compared to most other regions.

Top 50 Countries

Rankings 1–15

Rankings 16–32

Rankings 33–50

Data Collection Methodology

• Data Selection: Given that Google retains all search query data related to cryptocurrencies, identifying the most reliable dataset was crucial. To ensure comprehensiveness, datasets from SEMRUSH, Ahrefs, DataOs, Moz, and Google Trends were downloaded and analyzed.

• Data Comparison and Selection: Although results from SEMRUSH and Ahrefs—the two largest available datasets—are largely similar, significant discrepancies exist for many terms. In some countries, differences exceed 80%. Such variability makes combining datasets or filling gaps where SEMRUSH lacks data impractical, as the disparities are too large for reliable aggregation.

• Query Configuration: Broad match queries for “Bitcoin” and “BTC” cover scripts including Latin, Arabic, Hebrew, Cyrillic, Japanese, Hindi, Persian-Arabic, Tamil, Sinhala, Chinese, and Thai.

• Integration of Demographic and Search Engine Data: Population data comes from Worldometers; Google market share data comes from Statcounter. For this study, Google's market share in every country was recalculated as 100% to standardize the impact of search engine usage on the data.

• Calculating Per Capita Search Volume: Using the above data, per capita search query volume was calculated for each country. This step is essential for normalizing data across populations of different sizes, enabling apples-to-apples comparisons of Bitcoin interest regardless of national size.

• Data Visualization: The final results were categorized and plotted onto a Chloropleth map using the visualization tool Datawrapper.

The proportion of a country's population using the internet was not factored into calculations because those without internet access are unlikely to be interested in Bitcoin. Africa’s recently reported internet penetration rate of 40% is comparable to Europe and the U.S. in 2005. While still low, this figure is rising—and so is Bitcoin’s popularity.

Data Scope and Limitations

The BPI is limited by missing data from 77 countries, including China, Iran, Cuba, and 33 African nations (notably Tanzania, Kenya, and Sudan). The absence of key regional data results in an incomplete global picture of Bitcoin engagement.

In addition, the BPI is based on third-party estimates, as Google does not share specific search query data for Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies. VPNs also somewhat obscure search origins, though their impact on results is expected to be minimal.

Data from a few countries may be inaccurate because “BTC” is the name of a telephone company in the Bahamas, an internet provider in Botswana, and a shopping center in Slovenia.

The BPI provides a detailed view of global interest in Bitcoin through the lens of Google search queries. While this study uses the best available data, it should be noted that the BPI is not intended to definitively answer which country has the highest Bitcoin adoption. Rather, the BPI serves as a metric measuring general interest in and engagement with Bitcoin across countries.

Data shows Oceania has the highest BPI score, but Europe performs the strongest, with 41 out of 43 countries standing out. Additionally, countries with higher internet penetration tend to have stronger search data, meaning the data skews toward these nations.