Can Ethereum (ETH) Outperform Bitcoin (BTC) in 2025?

TL;DR

• Although it has moved a little from the multi-year low against BTC recorded earlier this year, ETH continues to struggle when compared to the largest cryptocurrency (and also the greenback).
• However, ChatGPT outlined several factors that can help it recover some ground and end the year on a high note.

Tech Factors

It has been said time and time again in the past several months that ETH’s price has failed to copy any of BTC’s momentum. While the largest cryptocurrency surged to a new all-time high in January 2025 at almost $110,000, Ethereum was stopped on a couple of occasions at $4,000 and came nowhere near its 2021 peak.

The current price tag of just over $1,800 means that ETH actually trades lower against the dollar now than it did before the US elections (generally considered the beginning of the current cycle). The ETH/BTC trading pair reached a five-year low at under 0.018 a few weeks back and now sits very close to those levels.

Just for reference, the pair was above 0.15 during the 2017/2018 cycle when there was speculation about a potential “flippening.” That’s an 88% plunge!

Nevertheless, some analysts are still hopeful that ETH can make a comeback, and ChatGPT outlined what needs to happen for Ethereum to outperform its ‘bigger brother’ (is it really a brother?). The AI chatbot started by laying out the technological advancements the second-largest blockchain needs to go through, such as improved scalability.

Network upgrades, such as the just-completed Pectra, can enhance usability and restore some investor confidence in the underlying asset.

Market Sentiment

ChatGPT noted that both assets attract different types of investors. Bitcoin is seen as “the digital gold, with institutions and individuals largely viewing it as a hedge against inflation and a store of value.”

“Ethereum’s value proposition, though, lies in its use case as a programmable blockchain. If Ethereum gains wider adoption and institutional interest—especially in sectors like decentralized finance (DeFi), enterprise blockchain solutions, or NFTs—it could experience significant growth.”

Consequently, ETH needs to continue building within its own niche, even though Vitalik Buterin recently made some references to BTC’s simplicity. However, there’s a lot of competition within that field, and Ethereum trails behind some other big names, such as Solana, in terms of transaction speeds and costs. The Layer-2 solutions, which aim to solve both, have also faced a lot of criticism lately.

In conclusion, the AI chatbot said Ethereum “has the potential to outperform Bitcoin in certain areas,” but the latter’s role as the “primary store of value and its established position in the market may provide it with a more stable long-term growth trajectory.” In other words, ChatGPT is not too bullish on ETH outperforming BTC this year.