<blockquote>
  <p>Is UTXO synonymous with leftover money in an address and the only reason UTXO is even a concept is due to security concerns of not changing an address after every transaction? Hence, your "unspent outputs" must be moved to x address.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Not really. A UTXO is more like a particular bill or coin in that it's a specific "chunk" of value.</p>

<p>The reason UTXO is a concept is because bitcoin is designed as a set of UTXOs rather than as a balance. It's the same way cash is designed as a set of bills and coins rather than a balance. When you say, "I have $100.43 in cash", you mean that you have some set of bills and coins whose value totals to that amount. This is analogous to a set of UTXOs in bitcoin.</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Or am I missing something completely?</p>
</blockquote>

<p>I think what you're missing is that bitcoin was not designed to have accounts with balances as the primary implementation but to instead have a set of unspent outputs.</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>I read that you might have $10 balance in an address but your UTXOs might be $2 and $8 in the same address. How does this affect execution of a transaction on the blockchain?</p>
</blockquote>

<p>The blockchain doesn't care about addresses. If you have two UTXOs that you have the correct key(s) to claim, you can form a transaction that claims those two UTXOs and creates some new UTXOs as its output.</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Can somebody please shed some light on the difference between UTXOs and current address balance?</p>
</blockquote>

<p>A "current address balance" is the total value of all the UTXOs a particular key can claim.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-08-06T22:09:07.500Z
So what you're saying is that a (non HD) private key can have one address and multiple UTXOs which total the balance on that address?
wild_nothing
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-08-06T22:16:36.363Z
If you total the UTXOs, you get a number that you can think of as the balance on that address. But the blockchain itself doesn't give that number any particular meaning -- it's just UTXOs.
David Schwartz
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-08-06T21:49:06.733Z
2019-08-06T21:49:06.733Z
David Schwartz
<p>Is UTXO synonymous with leftover money in an address and the only reason UTXO is even a concept is due to security concerns of not changing an address after every transaction? Hence, your "unspent outputs" must be moved to x address.</p>

<p>Or am I missing something completely?</p>

<p>I read that you might have $10 balance in an address but your UTXOs might be $2 and $8 in the same address. How does this affect execution of a transaction on the blockchain?</p>

<p>Can somebody please shed some light on the difference between UTXOs and current address balance?</p>

<p>Thank-you!</p>

<utxo>
Is UTXO synonymous with leftover money in an address?
wild_nothing
# Is UTXO synonymous with leftover money in an address?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2019-08-06)

Is UTXO synonymous with leftover money in an address and the only reason UTXO is even a concept is due to security concerns of not changing an address after every transaction? Hence, your "unspent outputs" must be moved to x address.

Or am I missing something completely?

I read that you might have $10 balance in an address but your UTXOs might be $2 and $8 in the same address. How does this affect execution of a transaction on the blockchain?

Can somebody please shed some light on the difference between UTXOs and current address balance?

Thank-you!

**Tags:** utxo


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2019-08-06. Score: 4 | Accepted answer

> Is UTXO synonymous with leftover money in an address and the only reason UTXO is even a concept is due to security concerns of not changing an address after every transaction? Hence, your "unspent outputs" must be moved to x address.

Not really. A UTXO is more like a particular bill or coin in that it's a specific "chunk" of value.

The reason UTXO is a concept is because bitcoin is designed as a set of UTXOs rather than as a balance. It's the same way cash is designed as a set of bills and coins rather than a balance. When you say, "I have $100.43 in cash", you mean that you have some set of bills and coins whose value totals to that amount. This is analogous to a set of UTXOs in bitcoin.

> Or am I missing something completely?

I think what you're missing is that bitcoin was not designed to have accounts with balances as the primary implementation but to instead have a set of unspent outputs.

> I read that you might have $10 balance in an address but your UTXOs might be $2 and $8 in the same address. How does this affect execution of a transaction on the blockchain?

The blockchain doesn't care about addresses. If you have two UTXOs that you have the correct key(s) to claim, you can form a transaction that claims those two UTXOs and creates some new UTXOs as its output.

> Can somebody please shed some light on the difference between UTXOs and current address balance?

A "current address balance" is the total value of all the UTXOs a particular key can claim.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: So what you're saying is that a (non HD) private key can have one address and multiple UTXOs which total the balance on that address?  
> **username_1**: If you total the UTXOs, you get a number that you can think of as the balance on that address. But the blockchain itself doesn't give that number any particular meaning -- it's just UTXOs.  

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