Ethereum vs Hyperledger – Which one should you use

Ethereum is a public, distributed, and decentralized computing platform that was primarily designed for executing smart contracts. Since it is a decentralized platform, each participant(node) in the network has access to the same copy of the Blockchain network. Whenever a new block is added to the Ethereum Blockchain, it will be added to the universal copy that exists with all individual nodes in the network.

Ethereum runs on a virtual network called the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). In Ethereum, each node must pay “Gas” as the cost of each transaction they carry out on the network. This Gas is paid in Ether, which is Ethereum’s native utility token (cryptocurrency).

Hyperledger is an open-source Blockchain project developed and hosted by the Linux Foundation. However, it is a global collaboration among leading companies across finance, banking, IoT, technology, and manufacturing industries. It is a permissioned Blockchain framework designed for developing customizable Blockchain applications for specific business needs.

Since Hyperledger was developed keeping in mind the needs of organizations, it has a modular architecture and functions as a plug-and-play framework that allows enterprises to customize Blockchain applications according to their unique needs.

Pros of using Ethereum

• Ethereum’s powerful smart contracts engine makes it a generic platform for literally any kind of application. However, its permission less mode of operation and total transparency might be cost of performance scalability and privacy.
• If you wish to develop public, out-of-the-box applications. With Ethereum, anyone can create a node, and each node on the network will possess a copy of the Blockchain. This is best for B2C businesses.
• Are you comfortable working with third-party open-source tools/packages? Since Ethereum is an open-source platform, most of the tools used for developing Ethereum DApps rely on third-party, open-source projects.

Pros of using Hyperledger

• Hyperledger solves performance scalability and privacy issues by permissioned mode of operation and fine-grained access control. In Hyperledger projects, you can define the underlying infrastructure of the Blockchain, right from consensus algorithms to which nodes can decrypt which block on the network. This high-level of flexibility allows businesses to customize their Blockchain apps according to their needs.
• If you wish to develop B2B applications. Hyperledger was explicitly designed for B2B requirements and needs. It is a perfect tool for developing B2B projects and generalized applications, since many businesses are unwilling to keep their private data on public Blockchain platforms.

To conclude, both Ethereum and Hyperledger come with their unique advantages that come in handy for different business scenarios and challenges. You can choose to work with these two tools based on the requirements of your specific Blockchain project.