Bitcoin’s Mining Difficulty Rises for the Second Time in a Row — It’s Now 0.63% Harder to Find a BTC Block – Mining Bitcoin News

On August 18, 2022, Bitcoin’s mining difficulty increased again after the 1.74% rise two weeks ago on August 4. At block height 749,952 at 7:07 a.m. (EST) the network’s mining difficulty rose by 0.63% from 28.17 trillion to 28.35 trillion Thursday morning.

Bitcoin Network Recorded Second Consecutive Increase in Difficulty Since August 4

It is slightly more challenging to find a Bitcoin (BTC), block today than in the past two weeks, as difficulty adjustment algorithm (DAA), increased by 0.633%. This is the second consecutive rise after DAA rose by 1.74% in the previous two weeks, with block height 747.936.

It is now 2.37% easier to find BTC blocks than it was before August 4th, when the difficulty parameter stood at 27.69 billion. BTC’s hashrate has been running lower in terms of exahash dedicated to the network after reaching an all-time high on June 08, 2022, at block height 739,928.

That time the network reached a peak at 292.02 Exahash Per Second (EH/s). The hashrate continues to coast along at 182.40 EH/s. Foundry USA found block 749.952, the block which changed the DAA, this week. It contained 2.648 transactions as well as 0.1692 BTC in fees. This is on top of 6.25 BTC block subvention.

Foundry is the top mining pool during the last three days, as it commands 46.81 EH/s or 23.70% of the network’s hashrate. Foundry found 100 BTC blocks out of the 422 BTC blocks it discovered in the past three days. The second-largest mining pool today is Antpool with 34.17 EH/s or 17.3% of the network’s hashpower.

Bitmain’s Antpool has found a total of 73 blocks out of the 422 discovered. Today, there are eleven mining pools that dedicate SHA256 hash to the BTC chain. 1.9% of this hash is controlled by stealth or unknown miners.

8 blocks were found by unknown hash out of all the 422 blocks that were found within 72 hours. There are less bitcoin mining pools that mine BTC today than there were just a few months back, due to increasing difficulty levels and low BTC fiat currencies.

The most profitable bitcoin mining rig today is Bitmain’s Antminer S19 XP with 140 terahash per second (TH/s), and by paying $0.12 per kilowatt hour (kWh), the S19 XP gets an estimated $6.21 per day in bitcoin profit.

Using the current 28.35 trillion difficulty, today’s BTC exchange rates, and $0.12 per kWh in electrical costs, a Bitmain S19 Pro+ Hydro with 198 TH/s gets an estimated $5.36 per day in profit. Microbt’s Whatsminer M50S and the Whatsminer M50 can get an estimated $2.59 to $3.95 a day in BTC profit.

What do you think about the Bitcoin network’s difficulty change on Thursday? Comment below and let us know how you feel about the subject.

Jamie Redman

Jamie Redman is the News Lead for Bitcoin.com News. He also lives in Florida and works as a journalist covering financial technology. Redman is an active participant in the cryptocurrency community from 2011. Redman is passionate about Bitcoin and open-source codes. Redman has contributed more than 5700 articles to Bitcoin.com News since September 2015. These articles are about disruptive protocols that are emerging.