Sovereign communities

The Netherlands' pioneer bitcoin city project, started in 2014, which at its peak signed over 100 Arnhem merchants including a Burger King. Honest status: its payment processor BitKassa shut down under MiCA regulatory pressure, so live merchant acceptance has thinned considerably, though the community, its merchant map, and regular events continue.

The original bitcoin circular economy, started in El Zonte in 2019 with an anonymous donation and a mandate to build a local Lightning economy. It onboarded shops, fishermen, and families years before El Salvador's legal tender law, which it directly inspired. The project now centers on education and community development; tourism, not necessity, drives much of today's spending.

A circular economy in Berlín, a 20,000-person coffee town in El Salvador's mountains, running since 2023. Around 150 to 164 merchants accept bitcoin — roughly a quarter of local businesses — and unlike El Zonte the users are overwhelmingly Salvadoran locals, not tourists. Built door-to-door by a small team; arguably the strongest evidence yet that everyday bitcoin commerce can work.

A township circular economy in Mossel Bay, South Africa, built since 2021 on top of The Surfer Kids nonprofit. All 21 staff are paid entirely in bitcoin and 32 local shops accept it. The team runs its own Fedimint federation for users who want a custodial option. Small, slow, and real — growth is measured in single shops, not headlines.

An effort since 2022 to make the Philippine resort island of Boracay a bitcoin economy, driven by payments startup Pouch.ph. Onboarding peaked above 250 merchants; more recent reporting suggests roughly 50-plus actively accepting, a reminder that merchant counts decay without constant tending. Still one of Southeast Asia's most visible bitcoin spending destinations.

A community-run Lightning economy along Costa Rica's southern Pacific coast, centered on Uvita and Dominical since 2021. More than 200 merchants accept bitcoin through its open-source wallet, and a Bull Bitcoin partnership added direct exchange to local SINPE bank rails. Adoption skews toward expats and tourism businesses more than everyday Costa Rican spending.

A circular economy project around Lake Atitlán, Guatemala, based in Panajachel since 2022. Roughly 80 businesses accept bitcoin, serving both local Mayan communities and the lake's steady tourist flow; side experiments have included mining powered by waste cooking oil. Smaller and quieter than its Salvadoran inspiration, with progress tied to a handful of persistent volunteers.

Italy's longest-running bitcoin merchant economy, founded in 2015 in Rovereto, Trentino, by Marco Amadori and local entrepreneurs. The area claims the highest density of Lightning-accepting merchants in Italy relative to population, and accepting businesses now hold their bitcoin rather than auto-converting to euros. A quiet, durable example rather than a tourist spectacle.

A nonprofit founded in 2022 to make Madeira a bitcoin island, working with merchants, schools, and the regional government. Over 170 businesses across the island accept bitcoin — about 62 in Funchal — and the group hosts a monthly meetup plus the Bitcoin Atlantis conference. Grassroots and volunteer-driven, though acceptance still leans toward tourist-facing businesses.

The City of Lugano's joint initiative with Tether, launched March 2022, to make bitcoin and stablecoins part of municipal life. Around 360 to 400 merchants accept BTC, USDT, and the city's LVGA token, taxes can be paid in crypto, and an annual forum draws thousands. Top-down by design — its momentum depends on city hall and Tether's funding.

A circular economy founded in 2021 in Jericoacoara, Brazil, by Fernando Motolese, known for onboarding schools and kids with NFC payment cards on a shoestring budget. In late 2025 the founder suspended operations and closed the community center in protest of Bitcoin Core's data-storage changes; as of mid-2026 its sites remain up mainly as a historical record.

BIES, short for Build in El Salvador, is an entrepreneurial network based in El Salvador centered on decentralized technology, generative living, and personal agency. It connects founders and builders who want to act and create locally. It is a people-run community, so its value depends on the organizers and members you actually meet.

An organization running month-long popup villages — temporary live-work communities for researchers, builders, and families — descended from 2023's Zuzalu experiment. Its flagship, Edge Esmeralda, returned to Sonoma County from May 30 to June 27, 2026, with 500-plus participants, en route to a planned permanent village. The gatherings are real; the permanent town is still a plan.

A libertarian micronation proclaimed in 2015 on Gornja Siga, a seven-square-kilometer parcel of disputed Danube riverbank between Croatia and Serbia. It issues citizenships, runs blockchain-based governance, and holds gatherings at Ark Village on the Serbian side. Honest status: eleven years in, no UN member state recognizes it and physical settlement remains minimal.

Balaji Srinivasan's residential startup society, running since September 2024 in Forest City, Malaysia — a famously underpopulated Chinese-built development near Singapore. Several hundred residents from 70-plus countries combine coliving, coworking, fitness, and a crypto-flavored curriculum; Malaysian ministers have shown interest in fast-track visas. It is a paid program inside a landlord's towers, not a sovereign community.

A venture-backed network state project founded in 2019, which raised $525 million in 2024 and claims over 150,000 online citizens. After years of criticism that it was marketing without a city, it announced a California site called Atlas in 2025. As of mid-2026 nothing has been built; treat the citizen count and the timeline with skepticism.

A private charter city on Roatán operating under Honduras's ZEDE law since 2020, with its own regulatory framework, bitcoin accepted as legal tender internally, and a growing medical-tourism niche. Honduras repealed the ZEDE law in 2022; Próspera is pursuing roughly $11 billion in ICSID arbitration while continuing to build. Its entire legal foundation remains contested.

A network city of coliving neighborhoods founded in 2021, connecting 20-plus independently operated properties across the US, Europe, Latin America, and Asia under shared culture and tooling. It began as a DAO; the broader neighborhood-organizing work has since spun out into the Neighborhood Village Project. Useful infrastructure for nomads, though smaller than its early hype suggested.

A movement founded in 2001 to concentrate libertarians in New Hampshire. Roughly 6,000 have moved — well short of the 20,000 pledge target — yet enough to elect dozens of state legislators and shape policy, including some of the most bitcoin-friendly laws in the US. Decentralized by nature: there is no headquarters to visit, just towns where free staters cluster.

A community-supported bitcoin campus in Nashville, open since 2022, with a second location on Congress Avenue in Austin. It hosts BitDevs, policy and mining summits, and daily coworking for bitcoiners — arguably the densest grassroots bitcoin programming in the US. Privately operated and membership-funded, so its direction follows its operators and sponsors.

The German-speaking world's bitcoin community, grown out of the Einundzwanzig podcast since 2020 into roughly 200 local meetups across Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and neighboring countries. Each meetup is independently organized — no company, no headquarters — coordinated through a shared portal. One of the strongest examples of a meetup network that outgrew its founding media brand.

A San Salvador-based education nonprofit founded in 2021, creator of the open-source Bitcoin Diploma that has been translated worldwide and taught face-to-face to over 27,000 students. Its formal partnership with El Salvador's government has ended, and the state's National Bitcoin Office now runs its own Diploma 2.0 in public schools. The independent, donation-funded education work continues.