what will happen after 21 million bitcoins are mined? (in layman's terms)

[Zamak]

This question has literally been asked millions of times.

A google search of your question returns

About 2,360,000 results (0.53 seconds)

The answer is that nothing will happen. Nothing will change except that there will no longer be any new bitcoins.

The number of repetitions of questions around this is due to the increasing number of beginners who want to know about bitcoin.
because I was almost going to ask the same thing on the google search engine. but I have seen the answer in this forum. so I undo my intention to search on the google search engine.

and the number of searches related to this question is incredible. this is a sign that many are interested in bitcoin.

[m2017]

I also have a question about what will happen after 21mln. bitcoins mined, but a specific one.

2140 year. Imagine the last bitcoin has been mined. From now on, it is impossible to get a new BTC, which means that all bitcoins that will exist at that time (to which there is access) will already have a history on the blockchain. That is, it will not be possible to get a "clean" btc and all will have owners in the past (most likely different), except for those that have not moved (but have access to them). Over the years, each bitcoin will go a long way and change not hundreds and thousands of its owners, so it will not be possible to say who owns it now. Will bitcoin be able to become more anonymous in future years (provided that the privacy of the owners is respected at every stage)? What are your thoughts on this situation in general?

[DVlog]

Earning by fees will be the motivation to run miners long before the last few Bitcoins are mined. The last block reward will be 1 Satoshi for about 4 years.

Just thinking about what will be the price of BTC by then. 1 satoshi for 4 years is insanely low if the price of BTC hasn't reached an insane figure of numbers. I won't be there by that time but I am happy with what I have right now and felt lucky to see the raise of giants which will change the economy of our society for the next hundreds of years.

[BIT-BENDER]

Well I think you have an idea what happens when all the 21 million Bitcoin completely enters circulation, there is no complications to it.
Satoshi Bitcoin creator made only 21 million bitcoin and although the aren't all mined but that's the maximum amount that can possibly be mined, once this happens now, all available would be in circulation and then would be controlled by the market, the demand of bitcoin then should surpass that of the supply so by my calculations I think when all possible bitcoin would have been mined we would see serious Bitcoin price rise.

[KingsDen]

Well I think you have an idea what happens when all the 21 million Bitcoin completely enters circulation, there is no complications to it.
Satoshi Bitcoin creator made only 21 million bitcoin and although the aren't all mined but that's the maximum amount that can possibly be mined, once this happens now, all available would be in circulation and then would be controlled by the market, the demand of bitcoin then should surpass that of the supply so by my calculations I think when all possible bitcoin would have been mined we would see serious Bitcoin price rise.

Very true that bitcoin price will skyrocket because it is only the individuals that will determine the demand and supply of bitcoin. The fundamentals will not have very much effects on bitcoin anymore.
But there are people who thinks that it is when bitcoin price will stablize to an extent, I.e when all bitcoin is mined. I do not so much believe in this school of thought.

But I have this thought that when miners are not expecting any other bitcoin from solving blocks, and bitcoin prices goes so high, people will shift from bitcoin to some good altcoins.

[cryptosize]

I don't think many altcoins will have survived until 2140.

Maybe Monero...

It was the same back in the 80s with internetworking protocols. TCP/IP was the dark horse. IPX looked promising, but where is it now?

IPv4 looks "ancient" and "spartan" compared to IPv6 (paltry adoption), but network effect (aka Metcalfe's law) is what matters the most, not being feature-rich.

We also don't know how humanity will be by then. How big the population will be (100+ years is a lot, we could have WW4 by then!), what kind of technology we will employ (a Dyson sphere could let us bump difficulty up to 192 digits).

I also don't believe that BTC's price/valuation (or more correctly: purchasing power) will ever stabilize to a straight line.

Every 4 years (until 2140) we will see a price increase, but with ever diminishing returns in every new cycle. Hyperbitcoinization (due to hyperinflation) might play out differently (constant parabolic/geometric growth).

Even in a potential BTC standard, I expect commodities such as oil and wheat to require less sats every 4 years, since BTC is deflationary.

[AGD]

Earning by fees will be the motivation to run miners long before the last few Bitcoins are mined. The last block reward will be 1 Satoshi for about 4 years.

Just thinking about what will be the price of BTC by then. 1 satoshi for 4 years is insanely low if the price of BTC hasn't reached an insane figure of numbers. I won't be there by that time but I am happy with what I have right now and felt lucky to see the raise of giants which will change the economy of our society for the next hundreds of years.

I guess no one will think about setting up miners to earn 1 satoshi (divided to all the miners in a pool!), but the fees, which are now at about 1-5 BTC per block.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I don't bet the average Joe will do the former.

Maybe. 20 years ago most people wouldn't have had an always on device in their pocket, let alone an always on device with constant internet access. Think of all the new always on and always connected devices people have now, from phones to smart fridges to Amazon Echos to video doorbells. Is a node that big a leap? And even if it is, then people can still use mobile Lightning wallets which will use a third party back end and let the end user use Lightning extremely easily.

-snip-

Having no new coins entering circulation will just make it even more obvious what absolute nonsense taint is, since every coin will have enough history to be able to be classed as tainted by almost any metric.

[Munir575]

I've been asked this questions many times, but it feels to me like I know answer it in the right way. I would like to know what do you think, and how you explain it in the most simple way, a way that people that are not technical can also understand

The overall number of Bitcoin will then be fixed, omitting any that have been lost in real time or whose private keys cannot be recovered, and the miner will only be rewarded with transaction fees. There are millions of souls on earth now, and this 21 million Bitcoin, which is highly divisible into Sats, will be more than enough to go around.