Weekly Crypto Mining Report: Difficulty Jumps 5.54% as Hashprice Hits a Series Low

This was the last week at the 140.58T difficulty set on 16 October. Hashrate stayed between 1,080 and 1,088 EH/s and averaged about 1,084 EH/s, a 3% increase from ~1,050 EH/s the previous week. That is about 8% above the ~1,006 EH/s needed to mine one block every 10 minutes at 140.58T, so blocks kept arriving ahead of schedule. A total of 940 blocks were mined in the six-day period (~157 blocks a day, a ~9.2-minute average block time), 8.8% above the 864-block target. That produced 2,937.5 BTC of block subsidy, worth around $237 million.

The faster pace triggered the expected retarget late on 29 October at block 973,728. Difficulty increased by 5.54% to 148.36T, in line with our forecast of +5% to +7%. The timing was poor for miners, because BTC fell about 4.6%, from $81.9K on 29 October to ~$78.1K on 30 October. Hashprice averaged ~$36.47/PH/day during the week, then dropped to $33.48 on Hashrate Index after the adjustment, the lowest level in this series of reports.

Bitcoin Mining Dashboard

Daily Network Data (24 – 29 October 2026)

Hashrate, BTC price, blocks and BTC mined are from ICR’s daily tracking sheet; blocks are the actual blocks found each day. Hashprice is realised subsidy revenue per PH/s (BTC mined × BTC price ÷ hashrate in PH/s) and excludes fees. * Difficulty is the level at the start of each day: it rose to 148.36T late on 29 October (block 973,728), so the new level applies from 30 October.

Daily BTC mined (bars) against network hashrate (line). The dashed line marks the 450 BTC/day target at 144 blocks/day.

Hashrate barely moved during the week (1,080–1,088 EH/s), so the daily swings in output came from normal block-finding luck. Saturday 24 October was the strongest day, with 174 blocks and 543.75 BTC (21% above target) and a realised hashprice of $40.81. Every day met or beat the 450 BTC target. Thursday 29 October landed exactly on it (144 blocks), and its $33.87 hashprice was the week’s lowest.

BTC Production & Miner Revenue

Production over the six days came to 2,937.5 BTC, or about 490 BTC per day. That is ~3.7% more per day than last week (~472 BTC/day), because hashrate kept rising while difficulty stayed at 140.58T until late on 29 October. At this pace, a full seven days would produce roughly 3,430 BTC. Fees stayed small, at about 0.5% of the block reward.

Bitcoin Mining Pools

Pool block counts, hashrate and shares as compiled by ICR from block-attribution data on 30 October 2026 (1,056-block sample).

Total pool hashrate was flat compared with last week, at ~1,056 EH/s (+0.1%), but concentration rose. The top three pools found 64.0% of blocks (62.6% last week), and the top five found 78.5% (77.8%). AntPool and F2Pool each gained 0.7 points, to 20.6% and 17.1%, while Foundry USA held at 26.3%. Luxor jumped to fifth at 5.6% (+1.5 points), pushing SpiderPool (4.5%, −2.2 points) and MARA Pool (4.5%, −0.8 points) into a tie for sixth. SECPOOL fell to 3.5% (−1.4 points). Binance Pool slipped to 0.85% ahead of its 10 November shutdown, and AntPool and ViaBTC each mined one empty block.

Pool outlook

Concentration is moving the way we expected. The top five currently stand at 78.5% and are on track to reach 79–80% over the next two weeks. Binance Pool closes on 10 November, and its remaining ~9 EH/s will most likely move to large FPPS pools such as AntPool, F2Pool and ViaBTC, which would lift the top three toward ~65%. Fifth place is now a three-way contest between Luxor (5.6%), SpiderPool and MARA Pool (4.5% each), so it can change hands from week to week on normal block luck. In positive news for decentralisation, two solo miners, Solo CK and a FutureBit Apollo home miner, each found a block this week.

Top 5 Bitcoin Mining Countries

Shares from the Hashrate Index Q4 2026 Global Hashrate Heatmap (unchanged).

Top 5 Mineable Proof-of-Work Coins

Compared with the 23 October snapshot, BTC fell ~4.1% to ~$78.2K and XMR eased ~3.8% to ~$586, while ZEC rose ~2.7% to ~$1,250. DOGE network hashrate was steady at ~2.8 PH/s (+1.6%), and BCH hashrate and difficulty both rose ~4%, to ~3.98 EH/s and ~530B respectively.

Mining Cost & Profitability

The table below shows illustrative electricity-only production costs at the new 148.36T difficulty, and at the ~155.6T early estimate for the 12 November retarget.

The retarget lifted the mid-case cost per BTC from ~$58.0K to ~$61.2K. At ~$78.1K BTC, the mid-case gross spread is ~$16.9K per BTC, or ~22% of price. That is down from ~29% a week ago and slightly below the ~24% we expected, because BTC fell further than we assumed. If the next retarget lands near +4.8% with BTC flat, the spread would narrow to ~18%. This is not corporate net profit: debt service, depreciation, hosting, staff, maintenance, SG&A and financing costs are all excluded.

ASIC Economics

ICR View: Last Week’s Calls, Outcomes & Next Week’s Outlook

What we predicted last week, and what happened

Scorecard: four of five calls held. The miss was hashrate. Miners kept adding capacity despite the 16 October difficulty increase, and hashrate finished about 1–2% above our range, so we are less confident that rising difficulty alone will cap hashrate in the short term.

Expected effects next week (30 October – 5 November 2026)

•             Difficulty: No adjustment is due next week, so difficulty stays at 148.36T. The next retarget is around 12 November (block 975,744). Our own range is +2% to +5%: at ~1,084 EH/s, the network is ~2% above the ~1,062 EH/s needed for 10-minute blocks at the new difficulty.

•             Hashprice: Each $1,000 move in BTC now shifts hashprice by about $0.42/PH/day. With BTC between $76K and $82K, we expect hashprice of roughly $32–35/PH/day. Our base case is ~$33–34/PH/day with BTC near $78K.

•             Hashrate: We expect hashrate to level off at about 1,060–1,100 EH/s. At $33.48/PH/day, machines less efficient than about 23 J/TH at $0.06/kWh no longer cover their electricity costs, which should slow additions.

ICR prediction & conclusion

Miners have entered a squeeze. Hashrate is at the highest level in this report series (~1,084 EH/s), difficulty has risen twice in two weeks (+5.92% and +5.54%), and BTC has slipped to ~$78K, leaving hashprice at $33.48, the lowest in the series. Our prediction for next week is unchanged difficulty, hash price of ~$33–34, hashrate levelling off near 1,060–1,100 EH/s, and about 3,200 BTC of issuance.

On pools, concentration is rising again (top three 64.0%, top five 78.5%), and the Binance Pool closure on 10 November should push it higher as its miners move to AntPool, F2Pool and ViaBTC. For the network, more hashrate means more security, but more of it now sits with fewer pools.

Sources: ICR daily tracking sheet (24–29 Oct 2026), Hashrate Index (30 Oct), ICR pool data (30 Oct), CoinWarz and Minerstat.