The Bitcoin network has experienced a significant increase in mining difficulty, reaching an all-time high of over 72 trillion with a block height of 822,528.
The 6.98% increase from previous levels shows mining operations are accelerating around the world, with more powerful computing resources being brought into the industry as miners prepare for the upcoming halving event. Masu.
The next difficulty adjustment will occur on January 5, 2024.
Intensifying competition
The increase in mining difficulty coincides with an increase in the Bitcoin network’s hashrate, which exceeded 525 EH/s on a 7-day moving average. The current hashrate at block height 822,590 is approximately 631.85 EH/s and the corresponding difficulty is 72.01 T.
The recent spike in Bitcoin mining difficulty and hash rate is a notable sign of the robustness and maturity of the Bitcoin network. This highlights the network’s resilience and ability to attract significant investment in mining infrastructure despite market fluctuations.
But this escalation also poses challenges for individual miners, who face increased competition and lower potential rewards due to increased difficulty. Due to the increased computational power required to mine Bitcoin blocks, the increased difficulty may reduce the rewards for these miners.
Bitcoin halving
These changes are occurring ahead of the Bitcoin halving, a significant event in the Bitcoin ecosystem that is expected to occur in about four months.
Halving, the process of reducing the reward for mining a new block by half, is an integral part of Bitcoin’s deflationary mechanism, designed to control inflation and mimic scarcity-based valuation similar to precious metals such as gold. Designed.
Bitcoin mining difficulty is a measure of how difficult it is to find new blocks compared to being the easiest ever. This difficulty level is adjusted approximately every two weeks to keep block generation time constant at approximately 10 minutes. This adjustment depends on the total computing power of the Bitcoin network.
Increased mining costs due to increased difficulty could impact the supply of new Bitcoins entering the market. This, in turn, can affect the price of Bitcoin, making these indicators important indicators for investors and market analysts.
