The Bitcoin (BTC) hash price, a metric that measures the daily revenue a miner can expect for each hash unit contributed to the network, has experienced a sustained decline since mid-January 2025, stagnating at current levels.
According to data from Hashrate Index, at the time of this article, that measurement stands at $0.044 per terahash per day ($/TH/day), down from $0.060/TH/day on January 17. This situation has raised alarm bells among miners, who rely on this metric to assess the profitability of their operations.
Bitcoin's hashrate has been falling since January. Source: Hashrate Index.
One of the factors behind this drop is the increase in Bitcoin's total computing power (hashrate) which gave rise to the beginning of the zettahash era on the network created by Nakamoto.
A higher hashrate is accompanied by increased mining difficulty, which lowers the hashrate, as it increases competition and decreases the rewards per hashrate unit. As difficulty increases, typically due to a higher overall hashrate due to more miners or more efficient equipment, more hashes are required to mine a block.
This reduces the probability that a miner with a fixed hashrate will find blocks, decreasing revenue per terahash per second (TH/s) and, consequently, the hashrate, which measures daily revenue per TH/s. For example, a 10% increase in the global hashrate can reduce the BTC hashrate by 10%, all other factors remaining constant.
However, this relationship is not absolute: a rise in the price of Bitcoin can offset the fall by increasing the dollar value of the rewards, while spikes in transaction fees also mitigate the impact.
For his part, in a report published on April 15, Jaran Mellerud, CEO of Hashlabs, called hash price “the most important metric for Bitcoin miners ,” highlighting its crucial role in strategic decision-making in an increasingly competitive sector.
Hash Price: The Pulse of Bitcoin Mining According to Mellerud
The hash price combines multiple variables from the Bitcoin ecosystem: the price of Bitcoin, transaction fees, block subsidy, and network difficulty. According to Mellerud, “It's the only metric you need to calculate miner revenue. It consolidates all the factors that affect miner revenue into a single powerful metric.”
This indicator allows miners not only to estimate their daily revenue, but also to “decide when to sell their mined bitcoins and evaluate the feasibility of new equipment investments, Mellerud writes.
Unlike other metrics, such as direct mining costs or total network hashrate, hashprice provides a comprehensive view of revenue per unit of computing power, making it a key benchmark for decision-making.
An analysis of the hash price crash, by Mellerud
Jaran Mellerud identifies several events and trends that have influenced the decline in hashrate, not only since mid-January, but also, extending that analysis to the mining ban in China in 2021.
China's 2021 decision caused a nearly 50% drop in the network's hashrate, according to Mellerud's data. This reduction in competition lowered mining difficulty, initially resulting in a substantial increase in hashrate during the summer of 2021.
However, benefiting from this period of high profitability, according to Mellerud, the Chinese ban led to miners outside that country proliferating in other regions. These new miners ended up increasing the network's total computing power, also increasing mining difficulty and, ultimately, reducing the hash rate.
Mellerud accompanied his analysis with the following graph of the hash price drop measured in BTC:
Jaran Mellerud says the hash rate has been falling since the mining ban in China. Source: Hashlabs.
Secondly, the Hashlabs CEO also believes that Bitcoin's hashrate has been growing steadily, driven by improved access to energy, capital, and more efficient machines, which has driven the hashrate decline. Mellerud expects this trend to continue in the future.
“The only certainty about the network's hashrate is that it will increase in the long term,” he stated. This increase in difficulty has diluted revenue per hashrate unit, affecting miners' profitability.
Another relevant factor highlighted by the executive is the halving that occurred in April 2024, as the reduction in the block subsidy caused a sharp drop in the hash price. In this regard, Mellerud points out that, although halvings will continue to occur every four years, their impact on the hash price will diminish over time, as transaction fees will become more important in miners' income.
Finally, Mellerud warned that miners with access to expensive electricity or outdated equipment face greater risks in this environment. “Miners operating on tight margins must act quickly to reduce costs or upgrade their machine fleets,” he advised.
