Bitcoin Hashrate Hits Seven-Month High Despite AI Shift

Bitcoin’s seven-day average hashrate has risen above 1 zettahash per second, or 1,000 exahashes per second, despite major publicly traded miners shifting computing capacity to artificial intelligence workloads.

The hashrate, which measures the computing power used to process transactions and secure the network, reached its highest level since March 3, according to BlocksBridge Consulting. The increase has kept competition high among miners that continue to operate on the network.

Bitcoin’s mining difficulty rose 5.92% on Oct. 16. BlocksBridge projects a further 5.16% increase at the next adjustment. If that estimate is accurate, difficulty will have risen by about 11.4% across two consecutive adjustments, requiring miners to use more computing power to earn the same amount of Bitcoin.

“That’s hardly the breathing room remaining miners might have expected from the AI migration,” BlocksBridge wrote.

The shift to AI and high-performance computing has taken mining capacity offline. BlocksBridge previously estimated that publicly traded miners’ realized hashrate fell 23% in one quarter, while their reported revenue from AI and high-performance computing rose 52%. The firm valued the displaced mining hardware at about $1.5 billion.

Some of that equipment may be returning to Bitcoin mining through smaller and mid-sized operators. BlocksBridge cited Sazmining, which advertises used Antminer S21 XP machines that customers can deploy through hosting facilities in Paraguay and Texas.

Used machines can cost less than new equipment for operators with access to low-cost electricity. Hardware sold by larger miners after AI conversions could therefore continue operating elsewhere. The amount of equipment that came from publicly traded miners and the amount that has returned to the network remain unclear.

CryptoQuant founder and CEO Ki Young Ju described the rise in hashrate on X as an indirect bullish signal for Bitcoin, writing that higher hashrate means stronger security and better fundamentals for the asset as a store of value.