Decentralization: DASH still relies on master nodes for confirmation of payments while bitcoin allows miners to settle transaction block disagreements through proof-of-work consensus without relying on a third party or trusted entity. This means that large network operators cannot censor or control payments made in the system. Master nodes also mean centralization in DASH where people would have to invest in expensive computing hardware to get into the network.
Transaction speed: Dash claims transactions are nearly instantaneous, while Bitcoin transactions can take up to an hour for 6 confirmations. Realistically, however, it takes much longer than that because master nodes do not coordinate transactions immediately. This means that confirmation of payments does not actually occur until much later when master nodes receive relevant information across the network and sync themselves with one another. Furthermore, this also means there is no thorough verification process to prevent double spending attacks on DASH because transactions are simply sent along without confirming whether they have occurred before over the same blockchains.
Private send: The currency allows users to anonymize their activities by breaking down payments into identical denominations and sending them separately to different addresses. The risk, however, is that if your wallet was hacked or stolen, there is no way for you to recover the money unless the hacker voluntarily returns it.
Coin inflation: New DASH are issued at a rate of 7% per year over the next 22 years in order to maintain the same number of DASH in circulation when all coins have been mined. This means that when all coins are mined in 2140 when miners stop getting rewards for operating nodes, payments will still be processed by users who pay fees in DASH. With bitcoin, however, miners receive new bitcoins as rewards for ensuring network security and processing transactions until 2140 when 21 million bitcoins are expected to be reached. This makes it possible for using DASH as a currency because it has an inflation rate of 7% per year. With no inflation, however, it is considered a store of value which makes it better for investment purposes.
DASH can be used to make instant payments online and in-store using its InstantSend feature. Transactions are confirmed by master nodes within few seconds instead of waiting for confirmation from miners who may take several minutes or even hours depending on the blockchain congestion. DASH also offers PrivateSend which allows users to break down payments into identical denominations before they are transferred to different addresses so that real user identities remain hidden, making them much more difficult to trace than transactions made with bitcoin.
This does not mean that transactions cannot be at all because researchers have already found a way to identify users who anonymize their payments by using a method called transaction linking. In fact, even those who use digital currencies for the sole purpose of preserving privacy end up becoming victims of hackers and criminals because information on transactions they make is recorded in public ledgers.
Creating new tokens: DASH uses a consensus system where miners and master nodes verify transactions and create new tokens. This ensures an incorruptible decentralized payment network but also means that DASH cannot be mined like bitcoin can be through standard computing hardware such as GPUs and CPUs. Instead, you need expensive ASIC hardware which makes mining unprofitable unless you buy such hardware or mine with other people using pools.
