willcl-ark/bitcoin-data-analysis

Bitcoin Data Analysis is a collection of notebooks and scripts that let you explore and analyze the Bitcoin blockchain without needing to run your own copy of the blockchain or download hundreds of gigabytes of data. Instead of dealing with the raw blockchain yourself, you tap into a ready-made dataset that Google maintains and makes available to anyone. The project works by connecting to Google's BigQuery, which is essentially a massive cloud database. Google has already parsed the entire Bitcoin blockchain into searchable database tables, every transaction, every fee, every block. The repo shows you how to set up a Google Cloud account, create the right credentials, and then write simple queries to pull exactly the data you care about. You can use either Python (via Jupyter notebooks) or R, and the results come back as familiar data tables you can chart, filter, or export. This is for anyone who wants to ask questions about Bitcoin transactions at scale but doesn't want to build the plumbing from scratch. A data analyst at a crypto exchange might use it to study fee trends over time. A researcher could look at transaction patterns across the network. A curious hobbyist might just want to poke around and see what's happening on-chain on a given day. The setup instructions walk you through the Google Cloud steps, including how to get started with Google's free tier credits, so you don't need to spend money to try it out. The README doesn't go into detail about specific analyses or insights, it's primarily a setup guide. The actual notebooks in the repository contain the analysis work, but the README focuses on getting you connected to the data source so you can start writing your own queries.