Bitcoin mining: the complete guide
How bitcoin mining works, what it earns, and who does it, from the team behind the Bitcoin Mining® magazine.
Bitcoin mining is how new bitcoin is created and how every Bitcoin transaction gets confirmed. Miners run specialized computers, called ASICs, that race to find the next block. The winner adds that block to the chain and collects the block reward plus the fees users paid. The work is expensive to do and cheap to check, which is what makes the record hard to rewrite.
Live network figures, refreshed daily. Data: mempool.space.
How bitcoin mining works
- Transactions wait in the mempool. Miners pick which ones to include in their next block, usually the highest fee rates first. See today's fees.
- Proof of work. A miner repeatedly hashes the block header (SHA-256, twice) with a changing number until the result falls below the network's target. Nobody can predict the answer; the only way is to try trillions of guesses a second.
- A block about every ten minutes. Every 2,016 blocks the network adjusts the difficulty so blocks keep arriving at roughly that pace, however much hashrate joins or leaves.
- The reward. The winning miner is paid the block subsidy, 3.125 BTC since April 2024, plus the fees in the block. The subsidy halves every 210,000 blocks; see the halving countdown.
The machines: ASIC miners
Bitcoin started on ordinary computer processors in 2009. Miners moved to graphics cards around 2010, then to FPGAs, and by 2013 to ASICs: chips designed to do one thing, SHA-256 hashing, as efficiently as possible. Today a machine is judged by its hashrate (TH/s) and its efficiency (joules per terahash). The best way to compare them is the ASIC miner buying guide and model-by-model profitability on aPanel.
The economics: what a miner earns
A miner's revenue is its share of the network hashrate times the bitcoin paid out each day. The industry shorthand is hashprice: dollars earned per petahash per second per day (about $39.29 today). Costs are mostly electricity: a machine's watts × 24 hours × the price per kWh. The gap between the two is the margin, which is why miners chase cheap, reliable power and why every halving squeezes the least efficient machines out.
Where mining happens
- Industrial sites with their own substations, from Texas to Paraguay, often paired with wind, solar, hydro or flared gas.
- Hosting: operators run machines for clients and charge for power and upkeep.
- Heat reuse: miners heating greenhouses, buildings and water, such as the two-miner hydronic system in our magazine.
- Home mining: smaller, quieter machines and solo mining, where one lucky block pays the whole reward.
Mining pools
A single machine might wait years to find a block on its own. Pools combine thousands of miners, find blocks more often and split the reward by work contributed. The first pool, Slush Pool (now Braiins), started in 2010. How pools pick transactions is itself an open debate; see the case for miners building their own blocks.
The rules miners enforce
Changes to Bitcoin's rules are proposed as Bitcoin Improvement Proposals and activated when the network agrees, with miners signaling readiness. Taproot activated that way in 2021; BIP 110 showed in 2026 what happens when a soft fork lacks that support. All proposals: BIPs explained.
From the Mining Disrupt stage
Operators, manufacturers and engineers on what actually works, from our keynotes and panels:
- Bitcoin Mining Site Diversification: Precision Miners' Edge — Krunal Joshi applies oil-and-gas risk tactics to hosting, betting that spreading sites across Missouri and Kansas ensures survival.
- Bitcoin Mining Arc Flash Safety: The Tyson Punch — Ken Worton argues that the industry's casual attitude toward megawatts is a lethal blind spot, comparing a 22,000-amp fault to a Mike Tyson punch.
- Mining Your Own Blocks: Vorick's Case for Better Hash — David Vorick argues that the Stratum protocol unfairly exposes mining farms to liability, proposing Better Hash to return block selection to the hardware.
- Softwarm Heats a Building With Two Bitcoin Miners — Two immersed Antminer S19 XPs feed a hydronic floor system, and the owner says the heat setup returns about $1.25 for every $1 of power.
- Why South America Could Be Bitcoin Mining's Next Hotspot — Hash House's Andres Romero on Paraguay's regulated hydro rate, Brazil's cheap energy window, off-grid gas in Argentina and Colombia, and banking.
- Reduce Bitcoin Mining Insurance Premiums — Thomas Shewchuck of Bitsure on three ways miners can cut fire risk and insurance premiums: surge protection, rotating maintenance and underclocking.
All stories from the Bitcoin Mining magazine
Bitcoin Mining®, the magazine and the expo
Bitcoin Mining® is the magazine and guide series published by Mining Disrupt, with five editions since 2023 (read the issues). Mining Disrupt is the Bitcoin mining expo where the people in this guide meet every year: March 22–24, 2027, Irving Convention Center, Dallas.
Questions
- What is bitcoin mining?
- The process that creates new bitcoin and confirms transactions. Miners use specialized computers to find each new block by proof of work and are paid the block subsidy plus fees.
- Is bitcoin mining still profitable?
- It depends on the machine's efficiency, the price of electricity and the hashprice. Efficient ASICs on cheap power remain profitable; older machines on retail power usually are not. Check a specific model on aPanel.
- How long does it take to mine one bitcoin?
- The network as a whole produces 3.125 BTC per block, about 450 BTC a day plus fees. A single machine earns a tiny share in proportion to its hashrate; in a pool that is paid out continuously.
- What do I need to mine bitcoin?
- An ASIC miner, a place with suitable power (often 240 V or three-phase) and cooling, an internet connection, a pool account and a bitcoin address. Many miners host their machines at a professional site instead.
- What happens to mining when all 21 million bitcoin are mined?
- Around the year 2140 the subsidy reaches zero and miners are paid by transaction fees alone. Long before that, each halving makes fees a larger share of revenue.
- Where can I meet bitcoin miners?
- At Mining Disrupt, the Bitcoin mining expo: March 22–24, 2027, at the Irving Convention Center in Dallas, Texas.
Three days. One floor. The whole industry.
March 22–24, 2027 · Irving Convention Center · Dallas
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