The Bitcoin blockchain recorded another difficulty increase on Sunday, January 29, 2023, at block height 774,144. The network’s difficulty increased by 4.68%, from 37.59 trillion to an all-time high of 39.35 trillion.
Bitcoin difficulty hits new all-time high as mining gets tougher
Bitcoin difficulty hit another record high, surpassing the record set two weeks ago, after rising 4.68% on Sunday. The increase occurred at block height 774,144, at 06:10 (UTC). The difficulty is now at 39.35 trillion, close to surpassing 40 trillion. The next adjustment is due on 11 February 2023.
The increase makes mining blocks more difficult, following a 4.68% jump following the 10.26% increase on January 15, 2023. The statistics for January 29 show a hash rate of 279.7 exahash per second (EH/s) over the last 2016 blocks , currently at 283.55 EH/s dedicated to the Bitcoin blockchain.
Statistics from macromicro.me on January 28, 2023 estimate the cost of BTC production at $21,176 per unit. On January 29, the spot price was 23,584 dollars. With spot prices higher than production costs, bitcoin (BTC) miners have recouped some losses from late 2022.
Pool distribution calculated by discovered blocks shows Foundry USA as the top mining pool with 101.47 EH/s, which is equivalent to 34.89% of the network’s hashpower. Antpool has 57.54 EH/s, or 19.79% of the total network hash rate. F2pool, Binance Pool, Viabtc, Btc.com and Braiins Pool follow Foundry and Antpool respectively.
With the increase in difficulty, block intervals, or the time between each BTC block, have been approximately 9:02 to 9:38 minutes. This is slower than the last 8:54 to 9:31 minutes recorded two days ago, but still faster than the 10-minute average.
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What impact do you think the increasing difficulty of the Bitcoin network will have on miners and the cryptocurrency industry as a whole? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
Jamie Redman
Jamie Redman is the news editor at Bitcoin.com News and a financial technology journalist living in Florida. Redman has been an active member of the cryptocurrency community since 2011. He has a passion for Bitcoin, open source and decentralized applications. Since September 2015, Redman has written more than 6,000 articles for Bitcoin.com News about the disruptive protocols emerging today.
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