The

Crypto-Ready Index

Which countries are most prepared for the widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies?

As cryptocurrencies become more popular around the world, a growing number of people are using and investing in popular currencies such as Bitcoin and Dogecoin. Some countries are now starting to put more infrastructure in place to join the crypto revolution, piquing the interest of their residents.

But, which countries present the most opportunity for people to start trading and investing, and show the most interest in crypto?

To find out, we’ve taken a data-driven deep dive and have analyzed measures including the number of crypto ATMs in the country, and how accessible they are for the general population. Further to this, we looked at the government’s legal stance on the ownership of cryptocurrencies, and whether or not they can be used in banks. Lastly, the interest in cryptocurrencies is what drives them, and therefore the number of online searches and increase in these over the last year is a good indicator of rising interest in each country.

By combining the scores for all of these categories we have formulated a ‘crypto-ready score’ (out of ten) for 200 countries and territories across the world.

The top five crypto-ready countries

1

United States

7.13/10
crypto-ready score

The number one country ready to adopt cryptocurrencies is the United States with a total score of 7.13/10. In terms of crypto ATMs, the USA is leading the way with over 17,000 which is by far the most in the world, as the next closest country has around 16,000 less. US law allows for ownership of crypto and its use in banks, and there has been a 140% increase in searches for cryptocurrency in the past year.

2

Cyprus

6.47/10
crypto-ready score

The Mediterranean island of Cyprus ranks second with 6.47/10, which is mainly due to the 33,941 people per 100,000 who searched for cryptocurrencies in the last year, this level of interest is the highest of any country in the world. Cyprus also allows the ownership and usage of cryptocurrencies, and there was a 139.6% increase in searches in the past year.

3

Singapore

6.3/10
crypto-ready score

The third-ranking country in the list takes us to a third different continent, as Singapore scored 6.3/10. Along with Cyprus, Singapore boasts over 30,000 crypto searches per 100,000 people, and the law also allows for owning and using cryptocurrencies. There are 10 crypto ATMs in Singapore, but as it is such a small country this equates to an ATM every 28 square miles.

4

Hong Kong

6.27/10
crypto-ready score

The autonomous city region of Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated places in the world with 7.5 million people squeezed into an area smaller than 500 miles squared, and it is also highly concentrated with crypto ATMs. There are 124 in the country meaning there is one on average every 3 square miles and one for every 60,000 people. Hong Kong also saw online searches for crypto more than double and their laws allow full use of crypto too.

5

United Kingdom

6.06/10
crypto-ready score

Fifth place goes to the United Kingdom with 6.06/10. Interest in cryptocurrency in the UK is growing rapidly with a 205% increase in crypto searches in the last year. Britain also has the third-highest number of crypto ATMs with 200 dotted around the country, on top of this the government allows the usage and ownership of cryptocurrencies.

Crypto-ready countries

Annual Crypto Google Searches per 100,000 People Crypto Searches Annual Increase Number of Crypto ATMs People per Crypto ATM Area per Crypto ATM Tax and Legislation (score out of 2) Total Crypto-Ready Score /10

Rank

Country/Region

The Adoption of Crypto ATMs

A cryptocurrency ATM works in a very similar way to a normal ATM except you are connecting to a cryptocurrency account rather than a bank and you can use crypto ATMs to buy cryptocurrency or to sell it and withdraw cash. Bitcoin machines are the most common crypto ATMs and there are over 20,000 across 77 countries worldwide, but some countries have much more than others. On top of this, we have discovered the number of the population per ATM, and the average number of square miles per ATM.

Highest number of crypto ATMs

United States

17,436
crypto ATMs

By an extraordinarily high amount the USA has the most crypto ATMs, currently, there are 17,436 in the States which is over 16,000 more than the next nearest country, Canada. Canadians have over 1,400 crypto ATMs which makes them the only other country to have thousands of them, as the UK is third with 200 ATMs. There are only 50 places with more than one crypto ATM worldwide, and then a further 17 with just the one.

Highest number of Crypto ATMs per capita:

United States

19,023
people per ATM

Determining where the most people have access to ATMs is also incredibly important as you can have as many as you like but if your population is huge, fewer people will still have access to them.

Once again the United States is the top ranked country by this metric, as it has a crypto ATM for every 19,023 people. They are followed by their northern neighbour Canada who have a crypto ATM for every 26,265. Bpeople, and the tiny nation of San Marino comes in third with one crypto ATM for its tiny population of 33,604 people. Japan has the highest number of people per crypto ATM, as if you want to use the only one in the country you will have over 125 million other people to contend with.

Smallest area per crypto ATM

Hong kong

3.46
square miles per ATM

Hong Kong has by far the biggest concentration of crypto ATMs in the world, on average there is a crypto ATM every three square miles. Hong Kong is only 429 square miles in total area and therefore having 124 crypto ATMs in the city is massive. The second and third-placed countries are two tiny places with Singapore having one for every 28 square miles, and San Marino has one crypto ATM for its entire 24 miles square area.

The Adoption of Crypto ATMs

Rank

Country

Number of Crypto ATMs

People Per ATM

Square Miles Per ATM

Crypto Google Searches

Interest in cryptocurrency is usually spread online, and as such, we looked at the Google searches in every country and then compared it to the population to see where it has the most searches per 100,000 people. We also looked at the increase in searches from 2019/20 to 2020/21 to see where interest in crypto is growing the quickest. These searches included terms like: best crypto exchange australia.

The countries most interested in crypto

There were 33,941 searches per 100,000 people in Cyprus in the past year which is the highest anywhere in the world, there are two other places with over 30,000 searches per 100,000 and these are Singapore and Gibraltar.

Countries where crypto interest is rising the quickest:

Rank

Country

20/21 Annual Searches

Population

Searches per 100,000 People

The countries where crypto interest is rising the quickest

By far the biggest increase in crypto searches came in Romania, with a 331% increase from 34,200 to 147,500 the past year. Second place was Greece which saw 226% increase in the volume of crypto related searches, and the third highest increase of 213.1% occurred in Canada.

Countries where crypto interest is rising the quickest:

Rank

Country

19/20 Annual Searches

20/21 Annual Searches

Search Change

Percentage Change

Methodology

Crypto ATMs:

To find the number of Crypto ATMs in each country we used data from: https://coinatmradar.com.

We then found out the number of ATMs per people and number of ATMs per square mile by finding out the population and area of each country and dividing it by the number of ATMs.

Tax and Legislation:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_bitcoin_by_country_or_territory was used to find out about the cryptocurrency laws of every country.

We then gave them a point if they allowed cryptocurrency to be owned, and another if it was allowed to be used in banks.

Crypto Searches:

To discover the crypto searches for each country we used google keyword planner to find google search numbers for each country over the past 48 months.

We then worked out the percentage change between the 2019/20 searches and the 2020/21 searches.

To find the percentage of the population searching we divided the number of searches by the total population.