Dash (DASH) and Zcash (ZEC): a comparison
Dash and Zcash set side by side: how the quotes moved, how the protocols are built and what tasks each one was made for.
Specifications of DASH and ZEC
| Dash (DASH) | Zcash (ZEC) | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $45.53 | $1,139.17 |
| Ticker | DASH | ZEC |
| Type | coin of its own network | coin of its own network |
| Launched | 2014 | 2016 |
| Built by | Evan Duffield | Zooko Wilcox-O'Hearn |
| Consensus | Proof of Work (X11) + masternodes | Proof of Work (Equihash) |
| Block | ~2.5 min | ~1.3 min |
| Privacy | optional | optional |
| In circulation | 12.89 M DASH | 17.03 M ZEC |
| Market cap | $586.52 M | $19.39 B |
| Rank by cap | #95 | #10 |
| Supply cap | — | 21 M ZEC |
Source: CoinGecko, Nov 10, 2026 13:27. How these numbers are counted
Price movement: DASH and ZEC
The start of the period is taken as 100 for both prices: the chart shows the difference in movement, not the quotes themselves.
| Period | DASH | ZEC |
|---|---|---|
| 7 days | +1.78% | +2.97% |
| 30 days | −8% | −4.31% |
| 90 days | +52.97% | +142.82% |
The link between their daily moves over the quarter is 0.61 (they travel alike).
The tasks DASH and ZEC were made for
- Transfers and paymentsDash
- Confidential transfersZcash
How Dash and Zcash are built
How Dash works
There are two layers here. The first is Proof of Work mining on the X11 algorithm, a block roughly every 2.5 minutes. The second is masternodes with a 1000 DASH collateral: they provide InstantSend, ChainLocks protection against chain reorganisations and optional CoinJoin mixing, and they also vote on the development budget.
What Dash is for
Dash is taken where speed matters — everyday payments and transfers: InstantSend locks a transaction in within seconds.
How Zcash works
Addresses come in two kinds — transparent, arranged as in bitcoin, and shielded, where sender, recipient and amount are covered by zk-SNARK proofs. The consensus is Proof of Work on Equihash, a block appears roughly every 75 seconds, and the supply cap is 21 million coins.
What Zcash is for
ZEC suits cases where the payer chooses the level of privacy: an open transfer if transparency is needed, a shielded one if confidentiality is.