Bitcoin’s basic unit change proposal triggers a dispute between “Sats” and “bits”

Author: Brayden Lindrea, CoinTelegraph; Translated by: Deng Tong, Golden Finance

A recent proposal to change the basic unit of Bitcoin to make it easier to understand as a payment tool has been opposed. Critics say Bitcoin’s “satoshi” is no more confusing than the “cents” of the dollar.

Bitcoin developer John Carvalho proposed Bitcoin improvement proposal 177 on April 23, which aims to eliminate the concept of "Sharu" (1 Bitcoin equals 100 million Satoshi) and effectively split the 21 million fixed supply of Bitcoin into 21 trillion units.

Previously, Bitcoin developer Jimmy Song proposed to create "bits" in 2017, representing one millionth of 1 Bitcoin. However, Carvalho said Song's approach still requires Bitcoin users to think about the decimal and “transfer complexity rather than eliminating it.”

Block Inc. CEO Jack Dorsey, one of the people who called for the change, said in a May 18 X post that satoshis is too confusing for beginners.

"Bits are better for Bitcoin, and Bitcoin itself is the best," Dorsey said.

Dorsey mentioned a discussion on the topic in December 2024, when Stevie Lee, the product head of Bitcoin infrastructure company Spiral, pointed out that not many people know or care about what "smart" is.

“Everyone knows bitcoin, but no one knows satoshi, people just want to send and receive bitcoin,” Lee said, recalling conversations from the past when people thought Satoshi was a brand new token that had nothing to do with bitcoin.

He added that the Bitcoin community doesn't have to worry too much about this change, because they know that the underlying economic mechanism of Bitcoin will remain the same.

Swan Bitcoin CEO Cory Klippsten and Byte Federal Product Director Michelle Weekley all opposed the change.

Weekley said on X: "People understand that a dollar is equal to a few cents, and they also understand that a bitcoin is equal to a few Satoshi."

Magdalena Gronowska, who claims to be a Bitcoin advisor, claims that the change may lead some to believe that the price of Bitcoin suddenly plummeted from the current $100,000, with its "supervision swelling significantly."

Parker Lewis, head of business development at Zaprite, believes that SAT is easier to understand. Source: Parker Lewis

Bitcoin founder is open to this

Robin Linus, founder of Bitcoin Virtual Machine (BitVM), emphasized that even Satoshi Nakamoto, the anonymous founder of Bitcoin, is willing to change the way Bitcoin units are displayed in order to improve availability.

“If it’s boring to deal with small numbers, we can change the position of the decimal point to display,” Satoshi Nakamoto said in a February 2010 post before disappearing the following year.

"The amount is the same, it's just a convention," Satoshi Nakamoto added.

Satoshi Nakamoto commented on changes in the unit cardinality of Bitcoin in February 2010. Source: Bitcointalk

Since the Taproot upgrade in November 2021, the Bitcoin network has not implemented any improvements that aim to improve Bitcoin’s speed, efficiency and privacy.