How to use the crypto mining calculator
The Mining profitability tab estimates what a rig earns. The Electricity cost tab prices the power of any device on its own.
- Enter your hashrate and power draw from the miner’s specifications. The example is an ASIC with 200 TH/s at 3,500 W. Measured wall power is better than the spec, because power supplies and fans add to it.
- Enter your electricity price per kWh. Use the all-in rate from your bill, including delivery and taxes, not just the energy charge.
- Enter the pool fee. Most solo miners would wait years for a block, so almost everyone mines in a pool that pays out steadily for a fee.
- Enter the network figures: network hashrate, block reward and blocks per day. The defaults follow Bitcoin’s rules (3.125 coins per block since the April 2024 halving, 144 blocks a day), but the network hashrate of 1,000 EH/s is only an example. Take a current estimate from a block explorer; it changes constantly.
- Enter the coin price and hardware cost. The price default is an example, not a quote.
- Optionally set a monthly growth rate for the network hashrate to see how rising competition stretches the payback period.
How mining revenue and profit are calculated
Coins per day = Share × Blocks per day × Block reward × (1 − Pool fee)
Revenue per day = Coins per day × Coin price
Electricity per day = Power (kW) × 24 × Price per kWh
Profit per day = Revenue − ElectricityHashrates must be in the same unit: 1 EH/s is 1,000,000 TH/s. The coins per day are an expected value; actual pool payouts vary around it.
Three break-even figures follow directly:
Electricity cost per coin = Electricity per day ÷ Coins per day
Payback days = Hardware cost ÷ Profit per dayThe cost per coin is also the coin price at which the miner only just covers its power. With network growth switched on, payback is counted month by month, with revenue falling as your share shrinks.
A worked example
A miner producing 200 TH/s on a network of 1,000 EH/s holds a share of just 0.0000002 of the network. Across 144 blocks a day at 3.125 coins each, less a 2% pool fee, that is an expected 0.0000882 coins a day, worth $7.94 at $90,000.
The miner draws 3,500 W around the clock, 84.00 kWh a day. At $0.06/kWh, power costs $5.04 a day, leaving $2.90 a day or $86.94 a month.
At that rate the $3,500 machine pays for itself in 1,208 days, assuming the coin price and network hashrate stay where they are. The rig breaks even on power at $0.0945 per kWh, and its electricity cost per coin mined is $57,142.86.
What changes mining profit most
Electricity, coin price and network growth dominate. Starting from the example:
| Scenario | Profit per day | Payback |
|---|---|---|
| Example | $2.90 | 1,208 days |
| Electricity at $0.04 per kWh | $4.58 | 765 days |
| Electricity at $0.10 per kWh | -$0.46 | Never at these inputs |
| Coin price $70,000 | $1.13 | 3,087 days |
| Coin price $120,000 | $5.54 | 632 days |
| Block reward halved to 1.5625 | -$1.07 | Never at these inputs |
Electricity is 63% of revenue in the example, so small changes in either the power price or the coin price swing the profit by large percentages. That leverage is why commercial miners chase the cheapest power they can find, and why home miners on residential rates often lose money on modern networks.
Difficulty and network growth
Proof-of-work networks adjust their difficulty to keep blocks arriving on schedule. When more hashrate joins, each miner’s share of the fixed daily reward shrinks. The constant-network payback above is therefore the optimistic case.
With the network growing 0.5% a month, the payback stretches to 2,063 days and first-year profit falls to $966.37. At 1% a month, the miner earns $892.69 in its first year and does not repay the hardware within ten years. Under these assumptions revenue eventually drops below the electricity bill and the miner is switched off. The chart shows this: the cumulative profit line flattens instead of reaching the hardware cost.
The network hashrate has historically trended up over long periods, but it can also fall, for example when the price drops and older machines become unprofitable. Treat the growth input as a scenario dial, not a forecast.
Halvings and transaction fees
Bitcoin’s block subsidy halves every 210,000 blocks, which works out to about four years. The April 2024 halving cut it from 6.25 to 3.125 coins, and at the current pace the next one is expected around 2028. A halving does not change your hashrate or your power bill, only the reward per block, so a miner that is marginal before a halving is usually unprofitable after it unless the price or the network adjusts.
Miners also collect transaction fees, which vary widely from block to block. To include them, add an average fee per block to the block reward. Many pools pay a share of fees along with the subsidy; check your pool’s payout method.
Pricing the electricity alone
The Electricity cost tab needs only watts, hours and price. One 3,500 W miner at $0.12/kWh costs $10.08 a day, $302.40 a month and $3,679.20 a year. The same tab works for GPUs and servers: four 300 W cards running 8 hours a day at $0.15 per kWh cost $43.20 a month.
What this calculator does not include
- Price and difficulty changes over time, beyond the optional monthly growth rate. Both move constantly, so the payback is a scenario, not a schedule.
- Cooling, internet, rent, repairs and downtime. Air conditioning alone can add a meaningful share to the power bill.
- Luck. Expected coins per day are an average. Pool payouts vary, and solo mining is a lottery with long dry spells.
- Hardware resale value and obsolescence. Newer, more efficient machines raise the network hashrate and push older ones out of profit.
- Taxes. In the US, mined coins are generally treated as income at their fair market value when received, and selling them later is a separate capital gain or loss. Our crypto tax calculator covers the sales.