Altcoins to watch in October 2026

Just last month in the previous edition, it was written that it wasn’t supposed to be altcoin season. Then, as September concluded, the Altcoin Season Index jumped above 50 from 33 in a single week (although it’s still short of the 75 it needs to make the call) and Glassnode's own gauge crossed into ‘altseason’ territory. 

Bitcoin's share of the market sat a little under 59%.

The five names below head into October with something concrete on the calendar: a network upgrade, a futures launch, a freshly listed ETF, a public testnet and a flagship conference.

1. Bitcoin Cash (BCH)

Bitcoin Cash closed September around $310, giving back part of a run that took it to $360 on September 23 but still roughly 40% above where it began the month. Most of that move came in a single week, when BCH gained 34% and tied NEAR for the strongest performance among the 20 largest cryptocurrencies.

It came after CME Group's announcement that it’ll list Bitcoin Cash futures on October 19, in standard (250 BCH) and micro (25 BCH) sizes, pending regulatory review. 

Grayscale is separately seeking to convert its Bitcoin Cash Trust into an NYSE Arca ETF under the ticker BCHG, but there’s no approval or listing date confirmed after the filing.

BCH's late-September slide suggests some of the same profit-taking may already be underway. It’s worth noting that Cardano and Chainlink each lost more than a third of their value between CME announcing their contracts and the launch earlier this year. 

2. Zcash (ZEC)

Zcash finished September in the $1,420 to $1,470 range, roughly 75% higher than where it started the month. Although a pullback shaved about 12% off its weekly gain in the final days of September, it still ranks in the top ten by market cap.

Grayscale's ZCSH, listed on August 25, held about $1 billion in assets as of the end of September. SoSoValue data showed about $233 million of net inflows by September 17 and more than $300 million a week later. The fund completed its 3-for-1 share split before the market opened on September 30, which cut the per-share price without changing what holders own.

Zcash’s NU7 upgrade goes on testnet October 6, with the block height for mainnet activation due to be settled around October 20 and mainnet targeted for November 5. It cuts block times from 75 seconds to 25 and leaves the halving schedule untouched after holders backed that in an advisory vote by 98.9%. 

The longer-term risk sits in Europe, where rules applying from July 2027 will bar regulated platforms from handling anonymity-enhancing tokens. How Zcash's optional privacy features will be treated hasn't been decided.

3. NEAR Protocol (NEAR)

NEAR ended September near $4.85 to $5.10, roughly 2.5 times its price at the end of August. The month's gain ranks among the largest of any top-100 token, though NEAR slipped about 8% on the day its ETF debuted, as some traders took profits on the run-up.

That ETF is now live. Bitwise's NEAR ETF began trading on NYSE Arca under the ticker NRR on September 29, the first US spot NEAR fund. It drew more than $30 million in net inflows on its first day and stakes its NEAR in-house to accrue rewards, which Bitwise says aren’t guaranteed. 

Grayscale has a competing filing to convert its NEAR trust, still pending. On the network side, NEAR Intents, its cross-chain trading layer, has passed $30 billion in cumulative volume.

Bitwise is pitching NEAR as infrastructure for AI agents and 2026 has made computing capacity the scarce resource in that narrative. In August, Bitcoin miner Riot Platforms disclosed a 20-year, $9.1 billion lease of 191 megawatts at its Rockdale, Texas campus, which Bloomberg and CNBC reported is for Anthropic. 

Crypto traders have used AI tokens like NEAR as a liquid way to trade that theme, though nothing ties the Riot deal directly to NEAR's price. October's question is whether NRR's early inflows keep pace once the launch-week attention fades.

4. Dogecoin (DOGE)

Dogecoin wrapped up September almost grazing $0.01, up about 12% in the month's final full week but still down roughly 60% over the past year. 

DogeOS opened a public testnet on September 30; it brings Ethereum-style smart contracts to Dogecoin without changing the base chain. Developers can build and test lending platforms, trading venues and games and every transaction on the testnet is paid for in DOGE. 

DogeOS, built by the team behind the MyDoge wallet, raised $6.9 million in a round led by Polychain Capital and the Dogecoin Foundation has backed the effort publicly. 

However, there is no mainnet date set yet. 

Dogecoin itself still can't verify the proofs DogeOS produces. It would require developer review, audits and miners’ support to come together to implement the change. 

October may be a test of whether builders show up on the testnet, the first evidence of whether Dogecoin can become more than a payment token.

5. Sui (SUI)

Sui closed September near $1.15, about 50% higher than its late-August level of roughly $0.76, after breaking back above its 200-day moving average for the first time in months. 

The network is closing in on 5 billion lifetime transactions and 21Shares began paying quarterly staking rewards to holders of its US-listed Sui staking ETF, TSUI.

The October event to watch is Sui Basecamp, the network's flagship conference, held October 7 to 8 in Singapore during TOKEN2049 week. Mysten Labs, Sui's main developer, is placing the emphasis of this year's event around AI agents and automated payments; it has promised product reveals along with a live attempt on the main stage to beat Sui's own record of 6,086,766 transactions per second, set in a July test, with CertiK verifying in real time.

However, records set in a controlled test is not a precursor to actual everyday network demand.

The steady weight on price is supply: approximately 64 million SUI unlock each month, which ETF inflows have struggled to absorb so far.

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