TOP Altcoins That Beat Bitcoin over ~3 years (Outperformed BTC)

By Alex Assoune Oct 26, 2025

Here are some altcoins which appear to have significantly outperformed Bitcoin over parts of the past ~3 years, along with caveats. Gathering exact 3-year returns for every coin is tricky, but several have stood out in analyses.

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Stock market information for Bitcoin (BTC)

Bitcoin is a crypto in the CRYPTO market.
The price is 122766.0 USD currently with a change of -1643.00 USD (-0.01%) from the previous close.
The intraday high is 125094.0 USD and the intraday low is 120701.0 USD.

Stock market information for Ethereum (ETH)

Ethereum is a crypto in the CRYPTO market.
The price is 4494.63 USD currently with a change of -202.05 USD (-0.04%) from the previous close.
The intraday high is 4754.2 USD and the intraday low is 4420.95 USD.

Altcoins that beat BTC over ~3 years

Altcoin	What Available Data Shows	Why It Outperformed / What to Watch Out For
XRP (Ripple)	XRP has shown very strong gains compared to BTC in recent years. For example, between January 2024 to Sep 2025, XRP’s return (~ +370-% USD) exceeded Bitcoin’s (~ +167-%) in the same period. (Coinpedia Fintech News) When converted into BTC-terms, XRP has also outperformed over certain intervals. (BitDegree)	The performance has benefited from regulatory clarity for Ripple, strong use case for cross-border payments, and favorable market narratives. But XRP is volatile and regulatory risk remains.
Solana (SOL)	Solana has had periods of especially high return compared to BTC. For example, Solana recovered from lows, hitting high levels (e.g. ~$160 in early 2024) after having been down severely. Some sources point out that Solana “skyrocketed” over multi-year periods. (TechCrunch)	Key drivers: growth in its ecosystem (DeFi, NFTs, apps), network improvements, faster throughput. Risks include scaling & congestion, competition from other L1/L2 chains, crypto market cycles.

More nuanced / marginal outperformers or mixed cases

Polygon (MATIC) has had huge gains in earlier years, but over more recent periods it has underperformed or had mixed returns vs BTC. E.g. large gains in 2021, then declines. (CoinCodex)
Many altcoins didn’t consistently beat BTC over a full 3-year span when evaluated in BTC terms, especially considering bear market periods.

Bitcoin’s performance baseline

To compare, Bitcoin over roughly the past 3 years has seen strong returns, but not nearly as strong as the biggest winners. Several reports give figures in the +300-400 % range in USD terms over that time. (InvestingHaven)

I couldn’t find a reliable, up-to-date published list that gives a complete ranking of the top 10 altcoins by 3-year return vs Bitcoin with exact numbers, but I found a few that are often listed among the biggest outperformers, and some data points to help approximate. If you want, I can try to pull together precise numbers from market-data sources.

Here are some altcoins & their 3-year performance (or close) vs Bitcoin, with what the sources report:

Key Data & Examples

From InvestingHaven:

Between mid-2022 to mid-2025, Bitcoin rose from ~ US $23,337 to roughly US $116,600, a gain of about +400-430%. (InvestingHaven)
Over that same period, Ethereum went from about US $1,800 to US $4,500, so more than doubled (≈ +150-200%). (InvestingHaven)
Solana had much stronger growth: from under US $1 to well over US $170, which implies a return of many thousands of percent. (InvestingHaven)

So in those comparisons, Solana clearly greatly outperformed Bitcoin; Ethereum did not, in that specific 3-year span, beat Bitcoin, though it had strong gains.

Observations & General Patterns

Solana is frequently cited as one of the top altcoins outperforming BTC over 3 years. (InvestingHaven)
Many big-cap altcoins (ETH, etc.) have done well in USD-terms but often not as well as Bitcoin when you compare % gains over the same period.
Some smaller or newer altcoins might have better returns vs BTC, but data for them is spotty in public sources.

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About the Author: Alex Assoune

Alex Assoune (MS) is a global health and environmental advocate. He founded Panaprium to inspire others with conscious living, ethical, and sustainable fashion. Alex has worked in many countries to address social and environmental issues. He speaks three languages and holds two Master of Science degrees in Engineering from SIGMA and IFPEN schools.

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