When Bitcoin was launched in 2009, people hardly knew anything about blockchain, let alone Decentralized Applications (aka DApps). However, when Ethereum was rolled out, things started changing and took a whole new direction as it provided a platform where pretty much everyone was allowed to conceive an idea, code the logic and deploy a DApp in a matter of days.

Just to give you a clue of what we are about to discuss, please note that every venture built on the Ethereum network, using its ERC20 protocol, is essentially a DApp. But it is worth mentioning that as of now, Ethereum is not the only platform providing this functionality, and we have a variety of other competitors as well, including (but not limited to) EOS, Tron, Steem, and Centrality. I referenced Ethereum only because it is well known, and you may understand easily.

So, let’s just have a look at the top 10 DApps in the market with respect to their user bases.

Note: The sequence does not exhibit any preference or endorsement, whatsoever.

Bloom

FinTech use cases have experienced plenty of advancements in recent years, and this is where a powerful and robust DApp (i.e., Bloom) comes into play. It is essentially a credit protocol, and the purpose is to offer a standardized ecosystem that allows users to access credit services.

With its futuristic risk management approach, Bloom allows onboard lenders (dealing in both fiat and crypto) to issue loans on the blockchain, thus maintaining a concrete and immutable record and bounding the borrower with the help of smart contracts.

The entire ecosystem consists of the following three components:

BloomID: It maintains a global registry of IDs, thus preventing the borrowers from exposing their private information at the time of transactions. This feature also allows the lenders to issue loans instantly, without having to verify the ID of a borrower manually BloomIQ: This is the credit registry which helps in the tracking of loans and debt obligations tied with respective users (Bloom IDs) BloomScore: In other words, it is the ‘rating’ of a user on the Bloom platform which allows the counterparty to have a fair idea about your financial stability

Sylo

This is a very dynamic application, running on Centrality protocol and takes communication to a whole new level. Apart from offering the basic messaging features, Sylo also provides the following perks:

Video calling Audio calling Maintaining an address book on the blockchain (you never have to worry about losing the contacts or someone stealing them) Storage Charging

The first three features are self-explanatory, so let’s just skip to storage and charging as they also happen to be the USPs of this communication app. Sylo’s decentralized storage network is dedicated to keeping your important data on the blockchain, thus ensuring that it always remains transparent and immutable. Furthermore, they have also incorporated the wallet recharging feature in the application, allowing users to send and receive money from the chatting interface.

Therefore, if we sum up this DApp, it happens to be a hub for personal and business communication, where users can conduct transactions and keep their data secure as well.

Sense Chat

Just like Sylo, their core and primary functionality is to facilitate blockchain-based communication. However, you can also send and receive money through the application, provided that you have an EOS account, as Sense Chat is based on that blockchain.

The best part is that your messages are always encrypted and decrypted at the respective ends, and nobody in between can decode them due to high-grade encryption.

Many people are curious about a middleman or an ‘operator’ listening to their voice calls in conventional applications, but the situation is entirely different at Sense Chat as there is nothing in between you and the recipient. You can talk freely without worrying about censorship!

e-Chat

Well, e-Chat elevates the communication niche. A major plus point is that they do not only make use of the blockchain technology but imply neural networks as well – a pretty hot field!

Let’s just skip how their messaging system works as we have read about that quite a lot in the above sections and jump to the list of their unique offerings:

A payment system running with NFC and QR Group chats with ultimate privacy and discretion Photo and video streaming Paid services for bloggers, vloggers, and publishers – taking your business to the next level! Utilizing neural networks to modify the appearance of broadcasts and video calls

BeeChat

If you have used Slack (a messaging platform), you are going to love BeeChat as the interface and core features are quite similar. It is not just an ordinary instant messaging app, but utilizes the blockchain technology to connect the following:

Games (and of course, gamers) Communities App store Live streaming Channels

So, if you look at it, BeeChat is offering a comprehensive platform where individuals, teams, and businesses can collaborate and increase their productivity with the help of a One-Stop solution.

Status

Their interface resembles Messenger (Facebook’s messaging application), but the underlying technology is entirely different.

This Ethereum-based tool offers multiple functionalities, ranging from encrypted messages to a wallet and Web3 browser as well.

Moreover, to provide a state-of-the-art messaging system, Status is well known for utilizing Whisper, which runs on dark routing principles. It implies that none (literally NO ONE) can view your messages, whatsoever. Just to give it another flare of security, Status has implemented an E2E protocol as well, called the Double Ratchet.

Apart from these extensive measures, they have a built-in Ethereum wallet as well, supporting ERC20 and ERC721 tokens, so you don’t have to conduct transactions through 3rd party.

FortKnoxster

Here comes yet another futuristic and robust messaging DApp. As the name suggests, it comes with military-grade encryption.

While it offers pretty much every feature discussed above, FortKnoxster has established a unique position in the market by providing screen sharing as well. So, if you look at it, it’s basically a Skype-like solution with military-grade encryption.

Just like most of the DApps, they are also offering secure cloud storage, so you can upload and download the files from there, without worrying about any deletion or alteration.

D.Tube

If you love watching videos and are familiar with YouTube’s interface, you are definitely going to love this venture. While D.Tube runs on Steem blockchain and stores every video in an unalterable state, it is essentially a copy of YouTube.

This video sharing service is aimed at recreating trust by thwarting censorship. It implies that everybody can upload any type of content without it being removed. Secondly, D.Tube also introduces a robust moderation technique where public voting is conducted in order to take actions related to content moderation.

Apart from this, they also follow Steemit’s business model, where every participant is rewarded according to his participation in the network (a social approach).

Please note that the more you participate in different events and the more activity you exhibit, the higher voting power you get!

Cosmochain

Despite being a young venture, Cosmochain has established decent credibility in the beauty niche and has formed alliances with the likes of Samsung. Just to clue you in about their growing popularity and acceptance, please note that when Samsung released its blockchain wallet, they selected Cosmochain to be the pioneering DApp service partner.

It is more like a social network with beauty geeks onboard. Basically, as an end-user, you just have to upload the content (make sure it’s relevant), share your experiences, write authentic reviews, and in return, the platform will reward you with COSM tokens.

Since people often search for beauty-related products on the internet, it is quite an innovative idea to get everyone onboard and incentivize their actions to stir up the communication and collaboration between members.

MakerDAO

It’s quite a different DApp than the ones listed above as the primary motive of this protocol is to run the stablecoin, called DAI. If you are unsure about the concept, please remember that 1 DAI is always equivalent to $1.

Therefore, with this approach, they can bring down the volatility issue, which is a big concern these days, and many people have lost their wealth due to BTC’s and ETH’s unexpected price fluctuations.

The DApp has gained considerable traction in the last couple of months as in March 2019, DAI, the native token, was holding roughly 2% of all Ethers.

Conclusion

The growing number of DApps and the dynamic use cases they offer is a clear indicator of an upward trend. It is evident that entrepreneurs and tech geeks are keen to incorporate decentralization in mainstream applications.

I mean, blockchain technology, which became popular when the first cryptocurrency was introduced in 2009, was only limited to ‘payments.’ However, over time, we have started using it for instant messaging apps as well… Who could have thought about it?