Cryptocurrencies, blockchain-based digital assets, are rapidly shifting from niche instruments to globally significant financial tools. However, understanding the diverse factors behind their adoption remains challenging. This study explores global cryptocurrency adoption between 2020 and 2024 across 144 countries, analyzing macroeconomic, socio-cultural, infrastructural, financial, institutional, and risk-related determinants. Employing variance-decomposition metrics (LMG and PMVD) to a cross-sectional, linear model’s estimates, it quantifies each factor’s relative contribution to adoption, also introducing a custom Monte-Carlo method for computational efficiency. Results highlight financial determinants, especially bank concentration, as major drivers, while traditional factors like GDP per capita and education show minimal influence. Attained findings underscore cryptocurrency adoption as complex and context-dependent, shaped by relationships rather than isolated factors, thus providing nuanced insights for any stakeholder within this context.