Bitcoin Mining Difficulty Drops 5% to 79.5 Terahashes, Marking Its Lowest Point Since March

A quarterly low of 79.50 terahashes (79.5T) was reached on July 5, a decline of over 5% in Bitcoin mining difficulty.

Bitcoin mining difficulty decreased by over 5% on July 5, dropping to 79.50 terahashes (79.5T) for the first time since March.

The adjustment, which occurred at block height 775,248, brought down the difficulty from the previous measure of 84.09T. This marks a decrease of 5.38% in mining difficulty, with the adjustment being triggered by a slowdown in hashrate.

According to data from BTC.com, the lowest difficulty measure recorded in 2024 was 79.47T on March 11. Difficulty has since risen to an all-time high of 88.10T in April and gradually declined to reach its current level.

Hashrate, a measure of the computational power used in Bitcoin mining, roughly translates to the number of guesses a mining machine is expected to make before solving the cryptographic puzzle and unlocking one of the remaining Bitcoins.

Hashrates are adjusted every 2,016 blocks, which takes roughly two weeks. Throughout Bitcoin's history, hashrates have largely increased month over month.

For instance, in 2014, the hashrate was around 1.1 gigahashes. At this low hashrate, most desktop PCs could mine Bitcoin (although a more powerful and energy efficient rig is needed to be profitable).

Hashrates finally crossed the terahash mark as adoption began to pick up steam towards the end of 2017. They will remain at 79.5T as of July 6, 2024, until the next difficulty change.

According to mining pool @f2pool_official, an ASIC rig with an efficiency rate of 26 watts per terahash or less will be able to mine profitably at the current difficulty measure of 79.5T, assuming Bitcoin's price remains above $54,000.

If the price of Bitcoin drops, more efficient rigs will be needed to keep miners profitable. The largest miners should be able to operate comfortably, especially in regions where mining facilities receive energy subsidies, if all else remains equal.