Bitcoin Cash is a fork of the Bitcoin protocol (based on the original code of Bitcoin) that happened on August 1st, 2017, rejecting the implementation of Segregated Witness (SegWit) from the same day.

Therefore Bitcoin Cash does not offer the benefits derived from Segwit. Most notably, Segwit resolves the transaction malleability issues, making it much easier to implement advanced trustless protocols such as Lightning.Segwit transactions include a version number for scripts so that the script language can be enhanced without hard forks: new opcodes can now be added by changing the script version. In particular, this will enable the seamless addition of more efficient signature schemes like Schnorr signatures. Combined with key aggregation, Schnorr signatures will further increase onchain capacity.

Having renounced Segwit, Bitcoin Cash offers a simplistic solution to scalability issues by raising  the block size limit to 8 MB for Bitcoin Cash versus 2 MB for Bitcoin. On May 15, 2018, Bitcoin Cash block size limit was raised from 8 MB to 32 MB.

Bitcoin Cash creation stems from the combined efforts of crypto personalities like Roger Ver, Amaury Séchet and Jihan Wu of Bitmain.