Much like sports, tech has fans who cheer for their “team” and root against all others. Blockchain is no exception. There are Bitcoin Maximalists who believe Bitcoin is the only digital currency we’ll ever need. There are Ethereum enthusiasts who think Bitcoin is nice, but the future is in dApps running on Ethereum and that is that. And then there are the challenger blockchains that have no shortage of promoters who are happy to tell you why their hot new blockchain is THE ONE.

It’s tempting to think there will be one blockchain that “wins”. The one blockchain that satisfies all the needs of every use case, every developer, every edge case. However, it’s not likely going to play out that way. Will all the current blockchains survive? Nope. But quite a few will. The trick is deciding which to bet on if you’re an investor, a developer, or an organization looking for a blockchain based solution. There are far too many blockchain projects right now to cover, but I’ll give my quick thoughts on some that I’m bullish on.

• Bitcoin Duh. The grand daddy of cryptocurrencies. Digital gold. It’ll power a settlement layer at the very least, leaving higher level apps and DeFi solutions to the youngins.

• Ethereum While Ethereum attempts to pull off Ethereum 2.0, there is no denying the first smart contract platform has serious momentum with its overall ecosystem. Complaints of slow performance, high gas fees, and the lack of real scale still haven’t deterred the bulk of DeFi to be built on Ethereum, which is a sign of Ethereum’s appeal.

• Polkadot Polkadot was started by one of the founders of Ethereum, Gavin Wood, and it’s clear to me that Gavin and team have a deep understanding of where a blockchain should go beyond Ethereum, tackling the current Ethereum issues as well as ones that are less noticeable but nonetheless important like governance.

• Cosmos “The internet of blockchains”. A wee bit hyperbolic but a good slogan nonetheless. Cosmos is providing a way for many blockchains to bloom. Polkadot would make a similar claim but in a different way.

• Mina A 22kb blockchain. Consider me intrigued. The approach and the use of zero knowledge proofs with a privacy first focus makes Mina unique.

• Algorand Focused on DeFi. Traction is impressive. Algorand is a good example of a blockchain focused on a particular vertical and aiming to be excellent at that.