Crypto Fear and Greed Indexes Use Different Signals and Schedules

Crypto sentiment readings can diverge because Alternative.me and CoinMarketCap build separate gauges with different asset coverage, inputs and update schedules, leaving no single standardized score for the market.

Alternative.me’s current index covers Bitcoin (BTC) only, although its introductory description also refers to Bitcoin and other large cryptocurrencies. Alternative.me’s index is a daily measure. Its listed weights assign 25% to volatility and 25% to market momentum and volume, comparing both with 30-day and 90-day averages.

The other listed inputs are social-media activity at 15%, Bitcoin dominance at 10% and search trends at 10%. The methodology also assigns surveys 15% but marks them as paused. The active components total 85%, and no treatment is specified for the paused survey share.

CoinMarketCap’s model has five components. It measures price momentum among the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, excluding stablecoins, and uses 30-day implied volatility and options put/call ratios for Bitcoin and Ether (ETH). It also measures Bitcoin against major stablecoins through the Stablecoin Supply Ratio and incorporates proprietary social keyword and user-engagement data. CoinMarketCap does not publish weights for these components.

The gauges also use different schedules. Alternative.me’s index is a daily measure, while CoinMarketCap’s latest API reading is cached and updated every 15 minutes. Its historical endpoint assigns daily values to 12 a.m. UTC, equivalent to 8 p.m. EDT on the preceding ET calendar day during daylight saving time or 7 p.m. EST on the preceding ET calendar day during standard time.

Category labels are provider-specific as well. CoinMarketCap classifies scores from 40 to 59 as neutral; its category bands cover scores from 1 to 100, while the overall scale runs from 0 to 100. Alternative.me assigns a fear label to a score of 40 and a neutral label to a score of 47. Those are separate examples, not readings taken at the same time.

A score reflects the signals and timing built into that provider’s model. Readers comparing figures should note the provider and timestamp, since matching numbers or category names do not establish that two gauges measure sentiment in the same way.