Bitcoin Mining. How Long Does It Take to Mine 1 Bitcoin?

Charlotte Miller

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Bitcoin Mining. How Long Does It Take to Mine 1 Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is one of the most popular cryptocurrencies, and for now, it is the most expensive coin in the market. Not everybody can afford investing in Bitcoin that’s why many people consider mining it as an alternative to purchasing it.

However, things aren’t so simple with BTC mining. The BTC blockchain utilizes the oldest and the safest for now Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism to confirm transactions and protect the network. In PoW, miners have to solve complex computational tasks to confirm blocks and add them to the blockchain. In 2009 and further, in 2010, when Bitcoin mining was not so popular, and the coin wasn’t so expensive, BTC mining was not challenging at all. One could mine a lot of coins by using an ordinary computer.

With the price growth of the cryptocurrency, mining has become so popular that just a PC is not sufficient now to benefit from mining the coin. Now, miners use specialized elaborate equipment called ASICs. And even this is not enough to make the activity beneficial. ASICs are combined in huge mining pools. These pools work day and night by consuming a lot of electricity and producing immense amounts of heat. And even with it, BTC mining hasn’t become any faster. Let’s check how long it would take you to mine 1 BTC and whether you can do it faster with the most elaborate equipment.

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Mining Difficulty

The BTC blockchain has a predetermined value of mining difficulty. Based on it, one block can be added to the blockchain every 10 minutes. Therefore, you can mine one block every 10 minutes if nobody else does it first. 

But what if you use super powerful computers able to solve the computational puzzles much faster than any existing equipment? The thing is that after every 2016 blocks, the blockchain adjusts the mining difficulty to enable adding one block every 10 minutes. If the system detects that blocks were formed faster than every 10 minutes, the difficulty of mining will be adjusted to return to the predetermined speed of block confirmation.

And on the contrary, if there are fewer miners or if for some reason the mining speed drops, the system will lower the difficulty value in order to speed up the block formation. Therefore, if you are asking how long would it take to mine 1 BTC, the reply would be the same: it will take approximately 10 minutes to add a block to the blockchain. 

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What if Mining Is Not for You?

If you decide that mining is not your activity, you can still try investing in Bitcoin. You don’t need to buy 1 Bitcoin, instead, you can buy a part of it. The cryptocurrency is divisible into many fractions called Satoshis. So, you can invest in 10, 20, 30, or as many Satoshis as you want.

And if you have a less popular coin and want to swap it to BTC, the best option to do so is to use an anonymous cryptocurrency exchange such as LetsExchange. There, you can exchange your coins without providing any personal or financial information, without limitations and account registration.

Bottom Line

Whatever you choose, mining or buying your preferred coin, make sure you understand the risks connected with dealing with cryptocurrency. Invest only those funds that you can afford to lose and without which you and your family won’t struggle. Learn whatever you can about the activity and the coin you are going to try. And never buy or sell coins under the influence of somebody: you spend your money, and you have a right to decide on your own.