Bitcoin Mining

Mining is where Bitcoin meets the physical world: power contracts, hardware cycles, heat, and the arithmetic that keeps blocks arriving roughly every ten minutes.

The mechanism in one paragraph

Miners race to find a hash below a target. Whoever finds it first publishes a block and claims the subsidy plus fees. Roughly every two weeks the network adjusts the difficulty of that target so blocks keep arriving at the intended pace, no matter how much or how little hardware is competing.

What we watch

• Hashrate and difficulty, and the gap between them that signals hardware coming online or switching off.
• Energy sourcing, curtailment agreements and the grid arguments on both sides.
• Hardware efficiency in joules per terahash, which decides which machines stay profitable.
• Fee revenue as a share of miner income, which matters more with every halving.