after 2140

[Zilon]

once the last bitcoin is mined possibly by 2140 hitting the said target of 21million bitcoin in circulation after series of halving before the said date as proposed by satoshi will there be honest nodes who will be satisfied with earning only from transaction fee?. So far we have reached series of consensus in the blocks, having honest nodes who  have maintained a good public ledger and has helped make bitcoin appreciated by all. I know the existing nodes will continue to stay honest but how about future volunteers who would choose to mine in the future will transaction fee be enough to compensate them for their time as the consistently confirm transactions through consensus algorithm thereby creating new honest blocks. sorry if my thoughts is weird but i just feel concerned since bitcoin belongs to us all.

[bitmover]

once the last bitcoin is mined possibly by 2140 hitting the said target of 21million bitcoin in circulation after series of halving before the said date as proposed by satoshi will there be honest nodes who will be satisfied with earning only from transaction fee?.

When the first block was mined, the reward was 50 BTC. Miners were mining basically for free, as bitcoin was basically worthless.

Then there was the first halving, the block reward was 25 BTC. Miners were making making.

Then the second halving came, the reward as 12.5 BTC. Miners were mining a lot and making tons of money. Bitcoin price continue increasing.

Then block reward became 6.25 btc. Miners are still mining, hashrate and bitcoin price reached new ATH. And the reward is nearly 10% of the original block reward.

It is probable that in a few decades onchain transactions will be more expensive and most transaction will occur in second layers solutions (like LN). Miners will always be mining, as difficult will change dynamically according to the hashrate. But i believe hashrate will continue increasing for a long time...

[NeuroticFish]

once the last bitcoin is mined possibly by 2140 hitting the said target of 21million bitcoin in circulation after series of halving before the said date as proposed by satoshi will there be honest nodes who will be satisfied with earning only from transaction fee?

Do you expect people have a crystal ball, or have been coming back from the future to answer you?
If not, then you know that any answer is a (more or less) worthless speculation.

If Bitcoin price will be to-the-moon and beyond, if the on-chain transactions will be many, the miners may be just fine with the earnings from the transaction fees of whatever it's included into the mined blocks.
If some miners will not be happy with that, they'll leave, the difficulty will decrease and the rest of the miners will earn more.

Hopefully until then most of the miner will use energy they get from free (eg solar panels they've finished paying for many years "ago") hence all they mine will be basically money for free.

[hatshepsut93]

The problem is, the less hashpower in the network, the cheaper it is to attack Bitcoin. And you don't need to look at 2140, even just in a few decades the block reward will already be small. It's really impossible to predict if transaction fees will be enough to retain reasonable amount of hashpower, and it's unknown how much hashpower is actually needed to keep the network reasonably secure. There's no point to worry about it, because it's way too distant and unpredictable, and when the time comes, we'll have some solution.

[Upgrade00]

It is probable that in a few decades onchain transactions will be more expensive...

Thinking more about this, if we expect on chain transactions to replace mining reward, then would that not discourage a lot of people from actually transacting with bitcoin? Considering how much it would cost to mine, I would not want to fund that with my fee on buying a product online.
I am confident that in the coming years the system would adjust for the inevitable situation where there would be no more bitcoins to be mined, maybe through second layer solutions as you suggested, but that could potentially present a problem as well.

[bitmover]

It is probable that in a few decades onchain transactions will be more expensive...

Thinking more about this, if we expect on chain transactions to replace mining reward, then would that not discourage a lot of people from actually transacting with bitcoin? Considering how much it would cost to mine, I would not want to fund that with my fee on buying a product online.
I am confident that in the coming years the system would adjust for the inevitable situation where there would be no more bitcoins to be mined, maybe through second layer solutions as you suggested, but that could potentially present a problem as well.

I always like to share this post from Hal Finney when we discuss second layer solutions:

I believe this will be the ultimate fate of Bitcoin, to be the "high-powered money" that serves as a reserve currency for banks that issue their own digital cash. Most Bitcoin transactions will occur between banks, to settle net transfers. Bitcoin transactions by private individuals will be as rare as... well, as Bitcoin based purchases are today.

As we know, Hal Finney was the receiver of the first bitcoin transaction.
He is suggesting that only big transactions would occur on chain in the future, and people will use other ways to transact (probably second layer solutions).

I agree that this is a possible distant future. We dont need to put every single transaction in the blockchain.

[Upgrade00]

I agree that this is a possible distant future. We dont need to put every single transaction in the blockchain.

There are lots of possible ways bitcoin could be utilized in the future for it to run efficiently, but it has to retain the main essence of the network which attracted the core bitcoiners.
Hal Finney's prediction could very well work out, same with the other possibilities.

[odolvlobo]

... will there be honest nodes who will be satisfied with earning only from transaction fee?.

It's hard to say what will satisfy people 120 years from now. The good news is that the subsidy drops by half every four years and it will probably drop below the transaction fees in a decade or two, so we don't actually have wait 120 years to understand what might happen.

A few people have come up with potential scenarios that may indicate a problem, but the future is still unclear. If you can think of a good (and supported) reason for why transaction fees won't be sufficient, then let us know.

[Smartvirus]

Is the mining fee really as tiny as peanuts with the way we look at it?
Maybe it is but with the fact that bitcoin price is however appreciating, so is the values of those peanuts going up too. Increased difficulty has brought about the creation of suffisticated machines to mine bitcoin and as such, increased cost of electricity and cost of mining per say. When mining is dropped in actual, the cost that comes with it would be dropped too and then, the value of the peanuts would be much more appreciated following market operations and that might just be worth the effort.

It's had to say bit,  I don't see bitcoin diminishing in the future!

[nc50lc]

That's a very famous topic that's been discussed quite frequently.

If you need more responses to that question, read these old threads:

• 2012: What happens when all bitcoins are mined?
• 2013: after all BTC has been mined, what then?
• 2019: How will Bitcoin survive after all 21M coins have been mined?

[pooya87]

I always find it weird when people ask this question which is very common too. I mean we don't even know what is going to happen 10 years from now, we all be extinct by then so how could we even begin to predict 100 years from now and how the world is going to be like? With the way technology is changing with new inventions in 2100+ we may only know bitcoin as an ancient technology. The CPU you had 20 years ago couldn't do 1/10 of what it is doing today, by 2100+ we will laugh at the total hashrate of today so talking about miners and hashrate and rewards are kind of silly if you ask me.

[worle1bm]

After 120 years could you imagine that what will the prices of bitcoin? Or even it would exist or not? We are taking about a century later so what can be said exactly to that i don't know.Even if it exists the miners will be willing to secure the network out of transaction fees only as there would be more transactions and even some sats would give them enough profits at that time so you see there are always rewards associated with it.But assumptions are there and we can't predict the future.

[Lucius]

This is an issue that has preoccupied many people from the very beginning, and although it is somewhat important in terms of the survival of Bitcoin, I think it is too distracting from things that are much more important at the moment. For me personally, it is much more important where Bitcoin will be in 5 or 10 years, because if it fails to survive in that period, then nothing after that will be important.

In less than 10 years, 99% of all Bitcoin will be mined anyway, and the question is how much interest there will be for the 1% that will remain available for the next 100 years (only 210 000 BTC). If the price of BTC will not be stimulating for miners in that period, perhaps even then large mining farms will become a thing of the past - because they exist for profit, not because they care about Bitcoin.

[Findingnemo]

If bitcoin exist by that time then miners are also expected to be here and you know why? The answer is simple the price of Bitcoin will be hitting the Mars by that time so when we calculate the rewards based on fiat value it is going to be higher than niw even just with the transaction fee alone.

[TheNineClub]

I don't think BTC will make it to that date in this capacity, something would have to change. As I said before, we should consider BTC as a stepping stone, and better solutions might come in the future because of it. So it's very well possible that people might lose interest in BTC mining, with it remaining as a store of value. Just like gold. Not all gold is mined, nor is anyone trying to mine all of the gold, but It still has its place as a store of value. At least I hope it goes in that direction because otherwise, I am not sure into what can crypto evolve.

[Darker45]

Your thoughts are not weird. As a matter of fact, you are the nth person to have asked this exact same question. What is actually weird is you raising this question at this point, after years and years of discussions on it and probably hundreds, if not thousands, of articles written on it.

Anyway, 2140 is more than a century from now. It is not for us to know the state of Bitcoin or mining at that time. Only time can tell. What is certain is that huge mining companies will definitely desist from operating if ROI is negative for years and years. But since the difficulty will also decrease as a consequence, I don't think mining will ever stop, provided Bitcoin hasn't grown worthless. So the worst thing that could probably happen is that mining will take several steps back, away from being a huge industry. It might go back to the day when it is being done by individuals in their homes.