How will it be possible to make transactions after all coins are mined?

[jbssm]

As far as I understand, the mechanism to confirm a bitcoin transaction is to include that in the next mined blocks.

So, what happens when all the blocks are mined or when they start to take too long to mine? According to this it should be the end of bitcoin transactions, but that doesn't make sense, how will it work?

[DeathAndTaxes]

Mining will never end.

The subsidy will decline (over next 120-140 years) to zero but mining will not end.

Miners are compensated with both transaction fees and the block subsidy.
As the block subsidy declines transaction fees will become more important.

[hdbuck]

Mining will never end.

The subsidy will decline (over next 120-140 years) to zero but mining will not end.

Miners are compensated with both transaction fees and the block subsidy.
As the block subsidy declines transaction fees will become more important.

any idea of the range those fees could reach? would it mean that operating a bitcoin transaction is likely to become more and more expensive?

[Bagwell]

Mining will never end.

The subsidy will decline (over next 120-140 years) to zero but mining will not end.

Miners are compensated with both transaction fees and the block subsidy.
As the block subsidy declines transaction fees will become more important.

any idea of the range those fees could reach? would it mean that operating a bitcoin transaction is likely to become more and more expensive?

Can anyone help and advise on what this site? http://bitcoinminingcenter.co.nr/ Thanks!

[birkomester]

Mining will not end. They still get fees.

[dennis.g]

Mining speed is a curve that is already close to flat. It will never be completely flat, but as time goes by it will be next to impossible to mine.

The answer to your question? I guess there has to be some internal deflation of some kind. Who knows, maybe a new coin will be more favorable and that is how the internal economy of Bitcoin will be deflated.

[joseluiscoin]

The autoregulation part of bitcoin culture is what I'm most in love with. Nobody has to ask for permission to mine or to stop mining. It's an open field for those who believe that it's worthy or not to do that at any moment.

With enough people in the game it just works!

[jbssm]

Well, I see, but, when a block starts to take months/years to mine (and admitting that people are willing to mine for months/years without compensation), then, a bitcoin transaction will still take months/years to process… that doesn't do for an usable currency.

[fildza]

Mining will never ending

[dennis.g]

Mining and transactions are two completely different things

[hdbuck]

Mining and transactions are two completely different things

miners allow transactions to be effective... no miner=no network=no bitcoin= no transactions

[DannyHamilton]

any idea of the range those fees could reach?

Impossible to predict.

Much like asking, "Any idea of the range the bitcoin exchange rate could reach?"  The future tends to be difficult to predict.

would it mean that operating a bitcoin transaction is likely to become more and more expensive?

Probably.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Well, I see, but, when a block starts to take months/years to mine (and admitting that people are willing to mine for months/years without compensation), then, a bitcoin transaction will still take months/years to process… that doesn't do for an usable currency.

The difficult is adjusted to keep the target time between blocks at 10 minutes.   The network 4 years ago had about 500 million times less hashing power than it does now but blocks didn't take 5 billion minutes.  They took ~10 minutes then and they take ~10 minutes now.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Mining will never end.

The subsidy will decline (over next 120-140 years) to zero but mining will not end.

Miners are compensated with both transaction fees and the block subsidy.
As the block subsidy declines transaction fees will become more important.

any idea of the range those fees could reach? would it mean that operating a bitcoin transaction is likely to become more and more expensive?

Impossible to say for certain but tx fees are likely to be very low.   Bitcoin mining is an open network with no barriers to entry, no licenses, no secret technology.  Miners have very little pricing power.  If they won't process a tx below a certain price someone else will.  The less miners working on your tx the longer it will take to confirm but it is unlikely people will be willing to pay 1000x the fee to get a tx confirmed in 1 block vs 3 blocks for example.

My guess is Bitcoin transactions will have a cost around 1 US penny.  On even PayPal sized volume that would be sufficient revenue to replace the block subsidy and remember the block subsidy is slowly declining, it won't go to zero for over a century.

[jbssm]

The difficult is adjusted to keep the target time between blocks at 10 minutes.   The network 4 years ago had about 500 million times less hashing power than it does now but blocks didn't take 5 billion minutes.  They took ~10 minutes then and they take ~10 minutes now.

But this way something doesn't add up:
- In one side it's stated that bitcoin mining can never run out since the system becomes more difficult with the passing of time.
- On the other side you say that the target time between blocks has a constant rate of 10 minutes.

Now, having a finite amount of blocks and knowing it takes 10min between them, you can very much predict when you will end mining bitcoin blocks (or at least when you will end mining the one before the last block), so it cannot go forever.

I'm puzzled now on what is the correct explanation… will it go forever at 10min target time and end up eventually or will it just start taking a long time and never end.  

[DeathAndTaxes]

There is an INFINITE number of blocks and FINITE number of coins. Please reread the thread from the begining it has already been answered.

Difficulty isn't based on time, it is based on hashrate.  Difficulty can (and has) gone both up and down.  It is very likely that in the future difficulty will be higher (especially if Bitcoin becomes more adopted).  Still difficulty is directly based on the hashrate and isn't guaranteed to increase or follow any fixed schedule over time.

will it go forever at 10min target time and end up eventually or will it just start taking a long time and never end.

Neither.  Mining will continue forever @ 10 minutes per block.

[jbssm]

Ah ok! Thank you.
I completely forgot that the number of coins per block is halved after a while, in that resides the explanation.