I must have missed the memo about people going into privacy coins such as Monero, Zcash, Dash, and Litecoin. To be fair, Litecoin hasn't seen much of a bump in price. However, Litecoin MWEB deposits have spiked in the same time frame. Over the years, I've had Cake Wallet and Dashpay. Recently, I moved my Litecoin wallet to Nexus, which has MWEB peg-ins available. I have used Dash the most, without enabling CoinJoin or using PrivateSend.
Monero (XMR)
Monero is still the gold standard for privacy. It's private from end to end. This, of course, has resulted in it being delisted from major exchanges. Monero will soon be added to Thorchain for cross-chain swaps in 2026, which should help increase its utility.
The main reason I haven't used Monero much is that it's not so easy for me to get some. I tend to transact in small amounts, which often don't meet the minimums of some of the exchanges. And, in order to get in and out of Monero, I'd be using the same wallets, which defeats the purpose of having privacy. That's me accumulating Monero for "savings". I think that if you use Monero for everyday transactions, particularly getting paid in Monero, you're better off than swapping into it.
Other than privacy, Monero is relatively fast and low-cost for transactions.
DASH
DASH has been my most used coin. It was very handy in the days when Blocktrades was available for getting in and out of Hive. When LeoDex joined Maya Protocol, Dash became an option again.
When it comes to privacy, DASH is not completely private. It merely obfuscates your transactions. Somebody with a bug up their butt about figuring out how you spend your DASH can figure out what you did when using PrivateSend. But it does offer enough privacy from average prying eyes. They offer two levels of CoinJoin, Intermediate and Advanced. I mostly use Intermediate as it's faster. But it's a moot point given that I upgraded my wallet with a Premium User Name.
DASH is one of the least expensive in terms of transaction fees. As for speed, it is almost instant when using InstantSend. Otherwise, it's about the same as the other privacy coins. Speed and low fees are primarily why I like and use DASH. In addition, DASH can be used for bill payments via Spritz.finance.
DASH was touting their privacy feature until they started getting delisted by exchanges. Then they changed their tune and dropped the emphasis on privacy. To this day, Crypto.com offers DASH for trading, but you can't deposit or withdraw it.
Litecoin (LTC)
I've been into Litecoin for about as long as I have been into Bitcoin. Given the choice, I prefer Litecoin to Bitcoin for spending as it is faster and less costly. It's because of Litecoin that I never really got into BCH. It is only relatively recently that Litecoin added MimbleWimble Extension Blocks (MWEB), which is an opt-in privacy feature. You can peg-in your LTC to MWEB and transact anonymously.
Litecoin is also an option for Thorchain and Maya swaps, which is useful.
Litecoin, like DASH, benefits from wide adoption. It's usually one of the payment options in most places that accept crypto. It's as fast as the other privacy options, except DASH InstantSend. Although, I think MWEB transactions might be slightly faster and less costly than Litecoin main chain transactions. MWEB has good privacy, but you can ruin it with spending patterns.
Litecoin's MWEB is getting some pushback. For example, if you send LTC to Binance from MWEB, they may shut down your account. AML compliance requires exchanges to report the wallets from which deposits are made. If they can't tie the transaction to a user, then it puts them in a tough spot. They'd rather not deal with it. They'll keep your LTC deposit too as the privacy feature means they can't prove it was your LTC.
Zcash (ZEC)
I had heard of Zcash over the years. But I never really gave it much attention. Most of the privacy glory has been directed towards Monero. I looked into it and now see it as a viable option. It has the same 21 million coin limit as Bitcoin. However, unlike Monero, privacy is optional like the other coins. A majority of Zcash users don't take advantage of privacy, but there is still something like 30% of the supply that is held privately. Zcash also benefits from being listed on exchanges given that privacy is optional.
I don't have much to say about Zcash as it's new to me. I downloaded the Zashi wallet in case I ever want to monkey around with it or opportunity to pay in Zcash arises.
My Take
I never really got into privacy coins other than curiosity. The reason that I don't get too involved in the privacy side is that you blow up the privacy when you do your taxes. The only way to maintain privacy, I think, is to not report your transactions. And while you may not exactly be money laundering, it's probably more like money dry cleaning where there are receipts. In my experience, being a bandit is too much trouble. You eventually slip up somewhere and have to explain yourself.
The only clean way to take advantage of privacy coins, that I can think of, is to start with a clean wallet and only accept private payments into it for spending. If you're loading up your private wallet from exchanges, you've already connected your identity to the wallet. On the other end, if you're using Monero, for example, to order coffee online, you've exposed your name and address. Privacy requires a level of meticulousness that I can't be bothered to maintain. The greatest value I see is in peer to peer transactions, yet I haven't many peers who are into crypto, much less privacy coins.
Despite all this, the prepper in me wants to have these options ready for deployment in case one day it becomes necessary, which may be never. But that doesn't mean there is no utility for the coins with optional privacy. Since you're reporting for taxes anyway (you're reporting, right?), you could simply use these coins openly. If ever a SHTF (shit hit the fan) moment arises where everybody is forced into privacy, then you can lump sum everything to the private side and transact peer to peer. It will be evident how much you started with, but after that it won't be easy to figure out how much you've privately received from and sent to others. That is to say, I can see a scenario in which privacy coins could become the standard, when everybody is forced to use them by circumstances. And those circumstances would also discourage record-keeping of sales much like selling in cash. Yard sales and flea markets would be ideal for privacy coins.
I am aware, however, that there are places in the world in which circumstances do require peer to peer transactions where you meet up with somebody, pay them local cash for crypto or dollars. The difference is that I live where everybody has dollars, which tends to dampen the interest in crypto for most people as they can transact rather anonymously to pay for things in cash. That's really what we're talking about with privacy coins, cash-like transactions where you can carry away your purchase without filling out forms or having to showing identification.
In that regard, the concern about anonymity is a little bit of bullshit because you aren't forced to have a bank account or pay with a credit card. You can just pay for things in cash and avoid ordering things online. This is essentially how illegal immigrants get by around here, they get paid in cash, not checks. And they pay for things in cash. For privacy coins to work as designed, you need a network of counterparties willing to transact in that privacy coin. Or, you have to go through great pains to keep your crypto wallet anonymous when it's an open ledger.
To sum it up, privacy coins are interesting to me. But they are of little use unless I can use them with the anonymity and ease of cash, which would need to be peer to peer or at a point of sale that doesn't track customers.