Brazil has overtaken India to become the world's top country for crypto adoption, according to blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis, but a major overhaul of its ranking system makes the apparent leap harder to interpret.
- In its 2025 report, Chainalysis ranked Brazil fifth, behind India, the United States, Pakistan and Vietnam.
- Its latest report, published Sept. 23, puts Brazil first, followed by the U.S. and Nigeria. India has fallen to sixth.
- But the two rankings measure different things.
The rules changed
Last year, Chainalysis primarily measured how much cryptocurrency people moved through exchanges and DeFi platforms, including separate categories for small transactions and whale transfers.
This year, the firm introduced a different framework, adding domestic transfers between personal wallets, cross-border activity and cryptocurrency balances held by users.
A country with lots of people using crypto to send money or hold savings could rank higher, even if it has less activity on trading platforms.
So Brazil's jump from fifth to first doesn't necessarily mean its crypto use suddenly overtook India's.
In its methodology, Chainalysis explains that it estimates where exchange customers live partly through website traffic, then adjusts those estimates based on national income.
The top 5 countries by grassroots crypto adoption. Source: Chainalysis
Its own example shows that India and South Korea each accounted for 8.1% of one exchange's traffic in June 2026.
After the adjustment, South Korea was assigned $13.87 billion in activity, compared with India's $3.78 billion.
The firm acknowledges that website traffic is imperfect, particularly because some users rely on VPNs.
Brazil's crypto activity is real
None of that means Brazil's first-place finish is artificial. Chainalysis estimates that the country generated $252.5 billion in crypto activity during the 12 months ending June 30.
Brazil also ranked among the world's top four countries in every category measured this year.
Brazil's first-place finish also comes against a mixed global backdrop.
Crypto activity worldwide fell 1.6% over the period, while Latin America's broader crypto economy grew 9.8%, according to Chainalysis.
The new rankings, therefore, show Brazil performing strongly across a broader range of crypto activities. But they don't establish how much of its jump from fifth to first reflects actual changes in adoption rather than changes to the methodology.
The Coinformer reached out to Chainalysis for comments and will update the story once and if the company responds.