Smooth Sailing: Top Five User-Friendly Crypto Apps

Table of Contents

• KuCoin
• PoolTogether
• Doctor Who – Worlds Apart
• Exodus Wallet

Even though the cryptocurrency sector has made leaps and bounds in many areas over recent years, one valid criticism persists. All too often, crypto and the underlying blockchain technology make things very complicated for the average user. 

Even now, in 2021, using an Ethereum application might require a user to acquire some ETH using fiat on one platform, then swapping it to an app token on another platform, keeping some ETH back to pay the gas fees. It's hardly an easy system to explain to newcomers and consequently locks many people out of the financial and entertainment opportunities available in the crypto sphere. 

As a result, many projects are now re-imagining the crypto user experience and making it simpler and more streamlined. While this approach helps attract newcomers, it also makes for faster transaction times, smoother onboarding to apps, and a UX that's more closely aligned to centralized apps and services. 

Here are five examples from across the crypto space where projects are walking the walk. 

KuCoin

Generating income from cryptocurrencies can be an extremely time-consuming effort. Many yield-chasers dedicate hours to seeking out the opportunities from DeFi, while traders spend hours glued to their screens in a bid for returns. Passive income opportunities do exist, but they generally involve settling for lower returns. 

KuCoin's Trading Bot aims to offer users the opportunity to earn passive returns from their cryptocurrency portfolios through automation. It's a major UX development for traders of all levels, bringing professional investment capabilities to everyday users. It uses AI-based parameters to allow users to adopt a set-it-and-forget-it investment strategy of their choice. 

The Trading Bot supports spot grid, dollar-cost averaging, futures grid, and smart rebalance strategies, allowing users to adopt a high or low-risk strategy, or both, according to their appetite. 

The move is evidently a hit among users, with the spot grid showing over 2.5 million bots in operation at the time of publication, earning rewards over 8,000%. It could provide the optimal balance of easy passive income without compromising on the yield that many in the crypto space are seeking. 

hi

The multiple barriers to entry listed above are part of the reason why crypto has so far struggled to take hold as a payment medium of choice. Users continue to navigate high remittance fees and slow transaction times. 

hi, a not-for-profit, community-powered financial services platform, aims to address this challenge with its payments system that's about as easy and accessible as it's possible to be. It leverages existing apps already familiar to users, such as Telegram or WhatsApp. 

All a user needs to get started with hi is a phone number, and they can get up and running within a few seconds. Once their account is active, it simply appears as a chat on the Telegram or WhatApp feed. Chat-based commands allow the user to transact in hi Dollars, including view their balance, send payments, or earn rewards, among other features. 

hi is currently operating in private beta but has nevertheless managed to attract over a million participants. The project plans to launch its own chain soon and will also integrate services such as fiat integration and a virtual debit card. 

PoolTogether

Newcomers to crypto often describe the feeling of going down a rabbit hole, and of all the rabbit holes in crypto, DeFi has to be the deepest. Clunky user interfaces, mysterious code that doesn't always behave as expected, and esoteric terms like impermanent loss mean that DeFi is still only understood by a small handful of users. 

However, there are a small handful of apps offering a more simple user experience, and PoolTogether is one example. It's a no-loss lottery based on a simple premise. Users deposit their funds, typically stablecoins, into one of PoolTogether's smart contracts, which sends the funds into an interest-earning app, such as Compound, for one week. 

At the end of the week, the smart contract withdraws the funds and distributes the interest as lottery prizes to randomly selected participants. Anyone who doesn't win receives their original stake back, and all funds are automatically rolled over to the following week. 

As an Ethereum app, users still need to navigate Ethereum's inherent complexity and pay gas fees in ETH, but as DeFi apps go, PoolTogether is about as simple as it gets. 

Doctor Who – Worlds Apart

NFTs have taken the world by storm and seem set to be a staple feature of the gaming and broader entertainment sector for the foreseeable future. The drive for NFTs, with their broad fan appeal, is pushing many projects to make them more accessible to everyday audiences. 

Doctor Who – Worlds Apart appears to be making significant inroads in this area. While other NFT games such as Axie Infinity require users to perform two or more token swaps, users can purchase DW-WA starter packs directly with fiat, even before the game launches in Q4 of this year. 

Purchase requires a login using an email address or Facebook/Google credentials, and from there, a user can opt to purchase their game card packs with crypto or with PayPal or a credit card. DW-WA has integrated with Crypto.com and DeFi app Vesper Finance to enable fast fiat onboarding and account balances and trades denominated in the VUSD stablecoin. 

Exodus Wallet

Transferring funds between wallets and exchanges is one of the biggest headaches for crypto users. It generates additional transaction fees, creates the risk of sending funds to the wrong address, and just makes for an overall clunky user experience. 

Exodus Wallet, which allows users to send, receive, and exchange Bitcoin and over 100 other cryptocurrencies via an intuitive interface, aims to offer users something different. It means that users always control their own private keys and can swap tokens without navigating an exchange. 

Along with the ability to swap tokens right in the app, Exodus offers other features, such as portfolio management and market data. It also provides several app integrations, including an integration with Compound that allows users to deposit funds and start earning interest from within the Exodus wallet apps. It also operates with Trezor hardware wallets, providing users with the additional option of cold storage while preserving the Exodus user experience. 

Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

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