Bitcoin mining; not worth it anymore?

[Abiky]

At this stage, Bitcoin mining is already a big boys’ game. If you’re not a large-capital player, this probably isn’t for you anymore. The days when solo miners could still make decent money are basically gone. Now it requires expensive mining rigs just to stay competitive, plus the electricity costs can easily kill your margins if you don’t have solid planning before jumping into this business.

if you want to accumulate bitcoin, i suggest you just buy and HODL.

I feel that Bitcoin has been long overdue for a mining reform, to help retain decentralization in the long run. The current mining situation is favoring big miners more than anyone else. By "big miners", I mean those with a lot of capital to invest in mining equipment and electricity. The only ones capable of doing this are businesses, companies, and governments.

I thought Bitcoin was supposed to be an egalitarian cryptocurrency? What's stopping developers from improving the mining algorithm in a way that would also benefit the "little guy"? If developers are concerned about security when changing the PoW algorithm, they can simply copy Digibyte's model (multi-algo approach) to solve the problem. DGB's multi PoW algorithms allows anyone to mine, and get rewarded in return. Bitcoin mining right now is starting to look like massive data centers where big companies dictate the rules of the game. At least, we have altcoins with a more egalitarian PoW mining system. Monero is one of them. For now, our only choice would be to buy and "HODL" BTC. Hope things change for the better in the long run.

[Publictalk792]

Bitcoin mining becomes extremely hard for normal people in 2026 due to smaller rewards, more competition, and extremely high costs. Mining alone is particularly difficult as large companies now use giant warehouses of machines, and it would be difficult to see single person make profit after electricity costs and gear costs. Better option is pool mining since you become part of group to receive smaller, steady payments, yet in most cases, it is just best action to take as beginner to buy and hold Bitcoin. Mining has turned into professional business that is difficult to win at home, unless you have access to very cheap power.

[asriloni]

Not sure if it is not worth anymore as in the last 2 years, there are a lot of solo miners who got lucky



https://www.webopedia.com/crypto/learn/most-successful-solo-bitcoin-miners/

So I don't think that they will just stop, they can still earn a lot by solving the puzzle. It might be a long shot, but again, based on the data, it's a chance that most of them are willing to go.

It's worth only if he free has money to spare. There's no definite time how long until he will found a block that will give him a jackpot like that. Chasing a block means you're doing lottery by keep spending bucks for the electricity everyday. If your luck ain't playing here, it can end up in disaster.

[CryptoYar]

[...]

Original purpose of Bitcoin was to be used equally by all, but nowadays majority of mining is carried out by large companies using expensive equipment and cheap power. This makes it extremely difficult to compete at home for normal individual, but developers are afraid of changing rules because they do not wish to make network less secure.

You are correct that other currencies such as Monero and DigiByte have other ways of making sure that little guy is not left behind such as having multiple systems or making sure that coin can be mined on normal computer. As of today, Bitcoin community does not want to see any changes as it would risk its reputation as Digital Gold, yet in long term, people might be able to make difference and bring back original vision of Bitcoin to its best state.

[Antona]

It's a different beast now if you're not doing it at scale with optimal conditions you're basically just donating to the network, which is noble but not profitable always DYOR on the latest ASICs and electricity rates before even thinking about it

[KiaKia]

No more for BTC if you are a solo miner bros, it takes high power & luck to be one of the miners who get the block reward. You also have to consider other things like electricity costs, because most likely you are not getting anything back from the electricity costs you pay. This part already dominated by big players such as Foundry USA, AntPool, ViaBTC & F2Pool.

On the local board, we recently discussed a solo miner who successfully mined block 928351. He changed BTC0.001 (hashrate rental fee) to BTC3.152 (block reward), a luck that he might not get a second time in his life.

You are sharing wrong information, solo mining don't necessarily need high power to run, it depends on the miner you are trying to use to solo mine Bitcoin, there are Solo miners that takes 65watts to run, the higher your hashrate the more the miner will take from the wall, it's not as if high power is a must if you want to solo mine Bitcoin.

People have got lucky using 4TH to solve a Bitcoin block in the past and 2025 solo mining result is even more encouraging but like you have said, electricity bill is all that matters here, if you can't afford it don't waste money on buying asic miners for solo mining.

To other readers my advice is to avoid solo mining if you want to solve Bitcoin block by all means, if electricity isn't almost free or extremely cheap it's going to be a waste of time, I don't expect anyone to pay much running BitAxe miners though but high electricity bill remains high regardless of how small the wattage of your miner is.

[Shishir99]

If you only came across bitcoin this year or in recent times, you might have heard of bitcoin mining already and how people can earn bitcoin through it. But in 2026, is bitcoin mining still worth it?

Most solo miners no longer seek profitability. They mine it because they love Bitcoin and want to mine it for as long as possible, holding the reward for the future. The mining farms mine Bitcoin professionally. Even if it doesn't look profitable at first glance, it can actually be made profitable. They chose a place where the electricity cost is the lowest on earth. I mean, they look for the cheapest electricity, and then they hold the mining reward as long as the market doesn't hit a new ATH or the company thinks they are not in profit yet. As soon as the company realize that they can sell in profit, they dump their coins on bull market.

[Obim34]

You all are trying to make a big deal out of Bitcoin mining, many small miners became very rich solving block via solo mining on their own, I would rather gamble on solo mining risking 100watts every day than spending money on lottery ticket.

Whatever you want, Bitcoin mining still got you covered, pool mining profitability relies on your electricity costs and solo mining relies on your electricity costs too and your tolerance on patience, spending on solo mining is one way ticket that needs to be purchased once compared to buying ticket 🎫 all the time.

The comparison shouldn't be between Bitcoin solo mining and lottery tickets, but between solo mining and investing using the same cost of operation. Which will you prefer?

If i'm not misplacing the user @philipma1957 still does solo mining, he would be in the best position to let us know which is better or whether solo mining is still profitable.

What I've known about mining is that you need the best computing power/machine to increase your chances of picking up a block faster, compared to another miner running a mining operation with less efficient machines. Solo miners are not earning enough, I don't think it is profitable or enough to keep them covered for long.

[Plutomanian]

If you only came across bitcoin this year or in recent times, you might have heard of bitcoin mining already and how people can earn bitcoin through it. But in 2026, is bitcoin mining still worth it?

With the block rewards being smaller and smaller with the complexity becoming harder with competition getting higher as well, some do not see mining worth it anymore especially if you’ll do it individually. The equipment is expensive as well as electricity costs. However, I am not discouraging you to not go into mining but maybe consider pool mining for example. It may be more worth it than mining individually. If you were planning on mining individually, it may even be a better idea if you just held bitcoin.

OP is making good sense here. Common none of us would be present to talk about mining work effective because most of us are probably lazy and not ready to min anything. The suggestion about buying bitcoins and holding it is really a good idea. We can do whatever we want and simply been on the same page because bitcoin is definitely a project that will yield huge profits for one when it skyrocket to the moon. There's this bullish season and I pray it comes quickly so we can start smiling, more better than wasting our time on mining which we know is very difficult.

[Z-tight]

OP is making good sense here. Common none of us would be present to talk about mining work effective because most of us are probably lazy and not ready to min anything.

It has nothing to do with laziness. Mining is expensive business, the cost of mining gears, space, maintenance, etc. And then even if you have funds for all these, you also need to have very cheap electricity in your location to be able to make profit through mining.

There's this bullish season and I pray it comes quickly so we can start smiling, more better than wasting our time on mining which we know is very difficult.

Lol, do you know what you are even talking about. You'll not have your bull run without miners. Mining is a very important part of the network. It is the means through which new coins are introduced to the system and miners also contribute to the security of the network. So you should be singing their praise.

[Antona]

If you only came across bitcoin this year or in recent times, you might have heard of bitcoin mining already and how people can earn bitcoin through it. But in 2026, is bitcoin mining still worth it?

Most solo miners no longer seek profitability. They mine it because they love Bitcoin and want to mine it for as long as possible, holding the reward for the future. The mining farms mine Bitcoin professionally. Even if it doesn't look profitable at first glance, it can actually be made profitable. They chose a place where the electricity cost is the lowest on earth. I mean, they look for the cheapest electricity, and then they hold the mining reward as long as the market doesn't hit a new ATH or the company thinks they are not in profit yet. As soon as the company realize that they can sell in profit, they dump their coins on bull market.

Makes sense the big operations treat mined coins like inventory, not a belief system they'll sell to cover costs or lock in gains. The solo guys are like collectors, mining for the love of the game
two completely different motives under the same activity

[Hamza2424]

Small solo miners are only gambling if they are on the mining game because the probability of them mining a block is very low. Mining is very expensive due to the cost of electricity, especially if you are in a country with expensive electricity. Your mining equipment will be the lastest. When you put all these expensive together including overhaul cost, you will understand the risk of what you want to undergo.

It's better to join a mining farm instead of thinking to be a solo miner.

Yep that's the best way to make money because we can't completely rely on our luck but we are adult enough to know if our luck is in our side or against us, so if it is in your favor in such cases and you have noticed it then for those lucky members I would suggest they should think about solo mining but people with luck like mine haha.

I won't suggest them to go solo mine, if you want to solo mine take a friend with you haha, just kidding but in farming the rewards is too low but to some extent with some resources and calculated input we can make it out otherwise we are in the wild and won't survive unless we are hunting for the block reward.

[vanesha]

Unless we want to learn things like algorithms or mining computation, it might still be suitable to do individually. However, seeking profit from Bitcoin mining no longer feels viable and is too demanding. With intense competition and block rewards that continue to decrease over time, many Bitcoin miners have started switching to mining other coins. Others prefer to leave mining altogether and sell their mining equipment.

[nakamura12]

I don't really know if it's worth mining bitcoin solo especially now that the rewards are getting smaller compared to the rewards before and there are mining pool who have lots of mining power compared to solo miners. For people who live in a country where electricity bill isn't cheap then I think it is not worth mining bitcoin unless that person has a lot of money and only mining for a sideline income or for other reason. For someone who doesn't have lots of money is that I don't suggest them to do solo mining but to join a mining pool.

[Shishir99]

Makes sense the big operations treat mined coins like inventory, not a belief system they'll sell to cover costs or lock in gains. The solo guys are like collectors, mining for the love of the game
two completely different motives under the same activity

You are correct. However, it is not as if solo miners do not make a profit. Their profitability also depends on how long they can hold it. If a solo miner can hold their reward for a long time, and Bitcoin price increase after a few months or even a year, they can sell at high price and they can make profits too. That is how solo miners also make profit from mining Bitcoin. I once bought hashpower from nice hash and forwarded it to a pool and tried my luck, but it didn't worked. I don't think I can afford it for a long time until I hit a block. So, I gave up.

[Patikno]

It all depends on the equipment you use, and the costs involved.

Let us assume you are using a Bitmain Antminer S19 XP (hyd. type). I have found that the unit price of this mining rig is around $5900, and I see that the revenue generated is around $9.50/day (based on available sources), or around 0.0001 Bitcoin. So, if we calculate it annually, the gross revenue is around $3460, but we need to calculate the net income. Assuming electricity and maintenance costs are half the daily revenue, the annual net income is around $1700.

So, we can conclude that mining Bitcoin may not seem profitable, but you need to think long-term. Let us assume that in 4-5 years, the price of Bitcoin triples (or 3x). Therefore, your annual income from mining would be $5100 ($1700 x 3). However, what if Bitcoin price increases 5 or 7 times in the next 5 years? I think you already know the answer, and you can do the math. In essence, profits will be immediately obtained if Bitcoin experiences an increase.

References : 1. bitmain.com
                  2. nicehash.com - Profitability Calculator

Just for the record, I could be wrong in some of my explanations, or assumptions. So, I hope you will still do your own research. Cmiiw.

[goldkingcoiner]

If you only came across bitcoin this year or in recent times, you might have heard of bitcoin mining already and how people can earn bitcoin through it. But in 2026, is bitcoin mining still worth it?

With the block rewards being smaller and smaller with the complexity becoming harder with competition getting higher as well, some do not see mining worth it anymore especially if you’ll do it individually. The equipment is expensive as well as electricity costs. However, I am not discouraging you to not go into mining but maybe consider pool mining for example. It may be more worth it than mining individually. If you were planning on mining individually, it may even be a better idea if you just held bitcoin.

Depends on the price you pay for mining.

Mostly it means you need cheap electricity but also cheap rigs affordable other costs (like renting room for the miners).

So to answer your question: yes, in countries with cheap electricity, mining Bitcoin is very profitable. But in countries with expensive electricity mining Bitcoin will only be worth it if the speculative value rises beyond your break even point.