The hashrate of the Bitcoin (BTC) network seems to have stabilized after a major fall, which led miners to downscale their operations due to declining profitability, rising electricity prices, and competition from artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure.
As per the four-year Bitcoin hashrate chart presented by Zach Pandl, Bitcoin's network computing power reached more than 1.1 zettahashes per second (ZH/s) in late 2025. Then, the network saw a significant course correction in 2026.
The hashrate has now started recovering to the psychologically important level of 1 ZH/s. As per the YCharts data collated by Blockchain.com, on Oct. 13, the Bitcoin hashrate is around 1.075 ZH/s. This is in comparison to the previous day's 1.003 ZH/s.
However, this hashrate level is still lower than a year ago.
Why did the hashrate of Bitcoin fall?
Declining profitability for Bitcoin mining has been among the major reasons for the drop, especially after the significant correction in Bitcoin's price following the October 2025 high.
As per a mining report by CoinShares, Bitcoin's hashrate fell from roughly 1,160 exahashes per second (EH/s) in October 2025 to 850 EH/s in early February 2026 (a nearly 27% plunge).
The decreasing price of cryptocurrency, coupled with high mining difficulty and relatively low transaction fee income, led to a major dip in miners' earnings.
In June, the hash price for Bitcoin, which represents miner earnings per unit of computing power, fell to a record monthly average low of $27.70 per petahash per second per day.
This meant that several operators with older mining hardware were struggling to meet their operational costs.
Rising electricity prices also contributed to the decline. As per CoinShares, this includes increasing power rates in Texas, temporary power curtailments, and winter-related events that forced some mining operations to reduce their output.
Arman Shirinyan
Dan Burgin
