Laszlo Hanyecz: the man who changed the history of Bitcoin

GraphGuru · 2025-11-17T04:07:14+00:00

Laszlo Hanyecz is known for the first Bitcoin purchase of pizza, but his contributions to Bitcoin's early development are significant. He adapted Bitcoin for macOS, worked closely with Satoshi Nakamoto, and pioneered GPU mining, amassing substantial BTC. His pizza transaction symbolized Bitcoin's real-world potential.

GraphGuru

2025-11-17 04:07:14

Abstract generation in progress

We know him as the one who bought pizza for BTC, but the story of Laszlo Hanyecz is much more than that. Fourteen years before this legendary acquisition, a Mac developer from Florida became one of the most influential figures in the early development of Bitcoin.

How it all started: from Windows to Mac

Since 2010, less than a year after the network launched, Hanyecz did something revolutionary - he ported Bitcoin to macOS. The fact that the network only supported Windows did not stop the developer. Right on his iBook G4, he adapted the source code, allowing Mac users to join the network. This was not just a technical task - it was an opportunity to expand the audience of Bitcoin.

Close work with Satoshi Nakamoto

Laszlo became one of Satoshi's most trusted authors in the early days. On the BitcoinTalk forum, they actively discussed fundamental issues: what makes Bitcoin valuable, how transactions work, how to scale the network. Interestingly, Laszlo did not always agree with the founder's ideas – he often questioned and criticized Nakamoto's proposals. Among the first five developers who helped improve the protocol, his contribution was recognized as critical.

Mining: the first GPU revolution

Laszlo was the first person to start mining BTC using graphics processors. His powerful gaming computer gave him a huge advantage: in the first two months of mining, he accumulated 35,000 BTC. Then an additional 80,000 coins were added. At that time, bitcoins were practically worthless - they were just digital numbers on a computer.

Legendary Pizza: May 18, 2010

Then everything changed. The Hanyets offered to buy him two large pizzas for 10,000 BTC. Two pizzas for crypto was a normal deal for that time. But history remembers this moment as the first known commercial transaction in Bitcoin. Today, those 10,000 coins are worth over a billion dollars.

Laszlo Hanyecz showed that Bitcoin is not just a theory, it is a tool. And although he did not become a billionaire on early coins, he went down in history as the person who made Bitcoin more accessible and proved its value through the simplest transaction - pizza.

BTC1,14%

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