How profitable is mining, really?

t4keheart

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Sep 24, 2019
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Hi guys,
Wondering how profitable it actually is to get into crypto mining.
How much one could expect as an initial investment to get running, the cost to run the server, and the expected payout?
Maybe if you mine, let me know your return rate?

I've always played with the idea of making a mining box, but I just really don't know if it would be worth it.
 
you are 3 years too late.

seriously.

now it's pennies.


This information is still generally accurate, and easy to see and understand for greenhorns. Select your card, select your electricity rate, and see your generally negative earnings unless you have newest gen hardware.
https://www.nicehash.com/profitability-calculator/nvidia-gtx-1070

Newest gen cards make a tiny little bit, one generation old cards basically break even against the cost of electricity, and anything older loses money - and that's about the way it goes.

Here's another profit calc for more advanced users:
https://whattomine.com/

1584678173167.png
 
lol jeeeeez. Had no idea it was that bad! I wonder how all those mining companies are doing now.

Well, maybe I'll just buy some bitcoin because the price is pretty tanked right now...
 
If you are going to buy equipment to mine, you are wasting money. Just buy your coin of choice instead.

If you are mining with equipment you already have, you might break even in the short term if you're selling immediately. The gamble is that if you hold it, it will increase in price. For example, that $0.36 you make a day with a 1070 might be worth $2.00 a day in 5 years.

Either way, still not worth it to buy masses of equipment to mine just buy it from an exchange instead.
 
If you are going to buy equipment to mine, you are wasting money. Just buy your coin of choice instead.

If you are mining with equipment you already have, you might break even in the short term if you're selling immediately. The gamble is that if you hold it, it will increase in price. For example, that $0.36 you make a day with a 1070 might be worth $2.00 a day in 5 years.

Either way, still not worth it to buy masses of equipment to mine just buy it from an exchange instead.

5 years? Have you seen the price fluctuation in the past 1 year?
 
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Yeah, so not profitable at all right now. But if you want to mine today (with hardware you already have), consider it an investment for when the price rebounds. Otherwise, just buy.
 
Depends where you are. Electricity is cheap where I am, 10 cents kwh. Makes it easier to turn a profit for sure
 
Depends where you are. Electricity is cheap where I am, 10 cents kwh. Makes it easier to turn a profit for sure

How do you figure? With the low price of BTC right now, even a 2080Ti is only making 27 cents/day profit with power at 10 cents/kWh.
 
How do you figure? With the low price of BTC right now, even a 2080Ti is only making 27 cents/day profit with power at 10 cents/kWh.

Which calculator are you using? Nice hash says 1.18 Cad per day profit for a 2080 ti
 
5 years? Have you seen the price fluctuation in the past 1 year?

My statement about $2.00 shows a 550% increase over the current price of around $6k. Even at it's height of $19k, it was never 500% of the current value, and I wouldn't expect it to be (barring some other external factor...coronavirus?) until about 5 years from now. On March 22, 2019, BTC was around $4000. March 22, 2020, it's around $6000. So if you mined $0.36 worth of BTC in March 2019, it's now worth $0.54. Sure, it has fluctuated between $3700 and $13,000 between those times, but so has the payrate. As profits increase, more fairweather miners come back onboard which increases the hashrate and lowers payouts. Pretty much you are always making the same $0.30-0.50 per day unless you plan on holding for years. I only used 5 years as an example. It's almost better to not look at the USD conversion, but look at what kind of BTC payout you're getting, especially if you plan on holding anyway.

I don't see any large scale miners ever really reaching a decent ROI in the current market. That being said, the 1st gen ETH asics are on their way out due to the 4GB memory limit on them, so it could be profitable in the short term as long as your video card has more than 4GB of VRAM. But I still stand by buying most crypto on an exchange (and maybe using idle hardware you already have to mine in spare time).
 
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Which calculator are you using? Nice hash says 1.18 Cad per day profit for a 2080 ti

The big number they show you is just income. Gotta look below to see what your net profit is. ~2/3 of your income is being eaten up in electricity costs.
 
Quite frankly, it has very rarely been profitable to mine and sell as you earn over the history of crypto. Only when price goes parabolic/to the moon does it become super profitable to mine and that's only until the price deflates or everyone else gears up and difficulty increases. The real way you make money with mining has historically been mine and HODL. Imagine if it was 2012 and you've got 3-4 cards mining 1 BTC/day that's worth $1-2 at that time? That was after price mooned to $30 and sank back down to that level.
 
Perspective has a lot to do with it. During the winter, mining to me is all profit because I utilize the heat to reduce the usage of my furnace. Mining rigs are pretty good little space heaters. I have an electric furnace. So, I'm not comparing to cheaper gas right now. Now that it is warming up, my mining is now zero as it isn't worth it to mine and I certainly don't need to mine at a loss to HODL. I can buy crypto at market value (which is more than mining at a loss) and HODL that for better odds of returns and profit. I also do not recommend going out and buying hardware unless you like flipping hardware every couple months which is also a gamble. Even low energy crypto like BURST isn't really worth setting up mining rigs anymore as the ROI just isn't anywhere near there. If you have the hardware already sitting around not doing anything, that would be different. If you have solar or wind turbine power that has already ROI'd itself, then sure consider using it for a gamble but I would say probably a better gamble to just sell that to the electric company.

Look at it this way. A single cell phone that cost me less than $10 earns me ~$1.50/day just streaming videos. My 20threaded CPU dual 1070Ti box mining NiceHash doesn't even have those profits. During warm months it is even worse because of cooling needs. Which would be smarter to invest in and run 24/7? The cell phone can burn itself up and I won't even care. The PC will require a lot more maintenance and won't ROI realistically unless prices skyrocket again like in 2017...
 
You are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too late if you want to make profit.

I'll leave my experience here with mining.

I bought 13 GTX 1060 3gb back in summer 2017 if I remember correctly. I paid about $200/card and I believe everything including parts cost me around $3000.
Then I started mining. So if we exclude $3000 investiment into hardware, I started from $0.
By late December, I had $34000 only from mining. That's about $8500/month. I was living the life!
Then it crashed haha. I managed to sellall my coins and earn some $3500. Sold also my hardware and got about $2000 back.
Electricity cost was high, about $150/month just from the computers. And the heat was unbearable, even during the swedish winter.

It was fun experience, but currently mining is not worth it.
 
Shit, I'd say you're about 9 or 10 years too late. I started mining back in 2012 and only did it for about a year. I would have made MUCH more money if I'd just bought the damn coins instead. I was mining LTC when it was <$2 per coin. I spent upwards of $20k on hardware including 12k on two Cointerra Terraminers and 23 video cards.

A friend of mine bought 45 gpus and sold the coins within 6 months of mining them to payoff the expenditures on hardware & electricity. I only made money because I held onto about half my coins. Actually I haven't made any money yet. still HODLing. Waiting & wishing for another spike. Been waiting for few years now. The bear market from 2013-2017 was depressing.

So if you're interested in mining to make money, here's my advice: DON'T mine!
Just speculate and buy the coins instead.

ESPECIALLY going into the summer. The mining profit calculators never account for extra air conditioner load. Not a problem with < 10 video cards. Even 10 cards is going to significantly add heat to your house. Cycling outside air is dusty and dirty, bad for hardware & fans. The winter time is really the only good time to mine crypto, imo.
 
Lots of hard-earned wisdom in this thread. In hindsight... what do you think was the problem? Was it mining in general? Was it mining at home?

What about the companies still in business here in May 2020 that offer co-location services along with the newest ASIC miners such as the Bitmain Antminer S19 Pro with a hash-rate of 110 TH/s and a power consumption of 3,250 watts?

I read another thread here at [H] that few people at [H] use the ASICs to mine. Why is that?

Thanks!
 
Lots of hard-earned wisdom in this thread. In hindsight... what do you think was the problem? Was it mining in general? Was it mining at home?

It's not necessarily a problem, it's the fundamental design of mining and cryptocurrency and the laws of supply and demand. The more miners that mine means the higher the difficulty (ability to earn) becomes. Miners are attracted to mine because they can make a return on their investment and turn a profit. So, as price increases, the incentive to mine increases until it reaches an equilibrium point to where miners are not willing to invest in order to earn the offered returns.

During the major run ups, supply of mining became limited because there was not enough hardware. If you remember back to 2014-2015, you couldn't find an AMD card in e-tail for a full year because you could buy a $250-300 RX 580 and make it back in crypto within 2-3 months of mining. Once the GPU supply issues were gone, mining returned to an equilibrium where it might be profitable on a variable unit basis, but you'll see a 1-2 year lag on earning back your investment (which historically has not been possible).

Basically, if your business model is to sell as you mine and there's not a shortage of mining equipment, you're likely not going to make a significant amount of money. However, if you mine and HODL on the off chance your cryptocurrency of choice moons, then all of these numbers are irrelevant. Imagine using a handful of cards to mine 1 BTC/day back in 2011 and 2012 and HODL'ing it until today... that's what everyone _wants_ to achieve.

What about the companies still in business here in May 2020 that offer co-location services along with the newest ASIC miners such as the Bitmain Antminer S19 Pro with a hash-rate of 110 TH/s and a power consumption of 3,250 watts?
Based on your description, those are companies who are making money off selling tools to fools during a gold rush....

I read another thread here at [H] that few people at [H] use the ASICs to mine. Why is that?

For some coins, GPU/CPUs are not fast enough to make any money. The ASICs are specifically made to hash specific algos and do it very well. CPU/GPUs have not been worth mining Bitcoin, Litecoin and others on similar algos since late 2013/early 2014 due to ASICs.
 
Yeah, if only I had known early on that Bitcoin would actually be worth something! I was mining on dozens of dual-socket Xeon servers as "burn-in testing" when we were ramping up a large order back in early 2010 when I worked at a computer assembly shop. Before Bitcoins were worth anything. (It was during that timeframe that someone "bought a pizza" for 10,000 btc.)

I had tens of thousands of Bitcoin, my wallet saved on a USB flash drive. Then I went to another job, changed my personal machines to "something worthwhile" (Folding@Home) and that USB flash drive broke. I made a couple attempts to recover it, and failed. But, hey, it didn't have anything important on it, so I threw it away.

Oh, if only.......

(Looking up "long dormant accounts" I bet this one was mine: https://bitinfocharts.com/bitcoin/address/12tkqA9xSoowkzoERHMWNKsTey55YEBqkv - not sure why it would have tiny amounts trickling in starting in 2012... But all "long dormant" accounts seem to have that.)

I have bought some more recently, but not even closer to "a fortune's" worth. (Like totaling a quarter of a bitcoin.)
 
Yeah, if only I had known early on that Bitcoin would actually be worth something! I was mining on dozens of dual-socket Xeon servers as "burn-in testing" when we were ramping up a large order back in early 2010 when I worked at a computer assembly shop. Before Bitcoins were worth anything. (It was during that timeframe that someone "bought a pizza" for 10,000 btc.)

I had tens of thousands of Bitcoin, my wallet saved on a USB flash drive. Then I went to another job, changed my personal machines to "something worthwhile" (Folding@Home) and that USB flash drive broke. I made a couple attempts to recover it, and failed. But, hey, it didn't have anything important on it, so I threw it away.

Oh, if only.......

(Looking up "long dormant accounts" I bet this one was mine: https://bitinfocharts.com/bitcoin/address/12tkqA9xSoowkzoERHMWNKsTey55YEBqkv - not sure why it would have tiny amounts trickling in starting in 2012... But all "long dormant" accounts seem to have that.)

I have bought some more recently, but not even closer to "a fortune's" worth. (Like totaling a quarter of a bitcoin.)
The small amounts are usually dust attacks for address linking.
 
This is a great discussion thread. Lots of interesting info.
Not much into BTC perfer the real items. At this point retiremnet is not far enough away to get into something as risky as the virtual money.
 
Mining ARRR (Pirate), ASIC Bitmain Z11 $13.53 a day, profit over $10/day. Those who were lucky and got Bitmain Z15 would be getting about $40/day (1200/month).
 
Depends, if you can get in early on a new Alt coin, and it takes off, you could do well, but you are playing the market like stock exchanges. I got into XRP very early, mind you I am not rich, but i could buy a new high end video card if i cashed out right now, and all i did was convert some Dogecoins I had in an exchange and liked the idea of XRP...
 
Sounds like mining is a poor way to obtain crypto coins.

Ponzi? online mining firms are a Ponzi scheme? Seems like something to avoid!

stay away from cloud mining

Pocatello I always wondered about those "rent our hardware to mine and make money" If they have all this hardware, why not just mine themselves and keep all the profits...thats right, cause charging some suckers to rent out gear is guaranteed income vs who knows what mining..
 
Electricity costs play a big factor, as well as the availability of hardware, someone earlier in the post said it best, you may be better off to buy your coin of choice as opposed to the hardware. I had a friend who purchased 3 ethereum at around 130$ a token and sold those same 3 early last week for a tidy profit.
 
Two years ago I bought a couple ryzen systems and 4 580s to mine until they paid off. They never did so I sold the extra two 580s and kept two systems. Fast forward to today, systems paid off and then some, provided I cash out. Plus I have two systems basically free (with creative accounting). I expect another crash, and the cycle repeating again. Maybe two or three more times.
 
Two years ago I bought a couple ryzen systems and 4 580s to mine until they paid off. They never did so I sold the extra two 580s and kept two systems. Fast forward to today, systems paid off and then some, provided I cash out. Plus I have two systems basically free (with creative accounting). I expect another crash, and the cycle repeating again. Maybe two or three more times.

I hear ya, I enjoy it as a hobby, and if it can pay for a hardware upgrade them excellent! My plan this go round is to purchase the crypto as close to the bottom of the bust as o can and then see where it goes from there.
 
I took the advice offered above in this thread. Last summer I bought some coins. Wish I had bought more.
 
you are 3 years too late.

seriously.

now it's pennies.


This information is still generally accurate, and easy to see and understand for greenhorns. Select your card, select your electricity rate, and see your generally negative earnings unless you have newest gen hardware.
https://www.nicehash.com/profitability-calculator/nvidia-gtx-1070

Newest gen cards make a tiny little bit, one generation old cards basically break even against the cost of electricity, and anything older loses money - and that's about the way it goes.

Here's another profit calc for more advanced users:
https://whattomine.com/

View attachment 231544
and today :
1610523173450.png


so he was not 3 years late, but 3 years in advance :)

u hash them BEFORE the price goes crazy, then when its All Time High u sell them (if u want)
 
I'm starting to think they left out a whole bunch of costs in their calculator
Some I am trying to figure out and some that are clear

1.00% Pool
0.65% Miner software

Transfer Fees
- Slow (75 Gwei) 0.003975 ETH / $4.93
- Fast (131 Gwei) 0.006943 ETH / $8.61
Exchange Fees
Taxes

If anyone has info for cheaper transfer fees or better wallets I am all ears.
Or a way to sell/exchange with reduced fees and taxes
 
and today : View attachment 318633

so he was not 3 years late, but 3 years in advance :)

u hash them BEFORE the price goes crazy, then when its All Time High u sell them (if u want)

FYI they only compute the electricity for the card not the whole system. You may want to add 50 to 100 watts to that depending what you have the card installed in
 
Right now, the last few weeks, point in time -- heck yes it is.

Mining is back in vogue

1612467187668.png
 
At those price I can imagine AIBs (if and I imagine they do have nice electricity) deal, keeping the card they make and mine with them, before selling them.
 
Mining is pretty decent again these days:

AM_2_5_21.PNG


A single 3090 is making about $18/day. That's like to good old days when a 1080Ti was making $10+/day.
 
Shit, I'd say you're about 9 or 10 years too late. I started mining back in 2012 and only did it for about a year. I would have made MUCH more money if I'd just bought the damn coins instead. I was mining LTC when it was <$2 per coin. I spent upwards of $20k on hardware including 12k on two Cointerra Terraminers and 23 video cards.

A friend of mine bought 45 gpus and sold the coins within 6 months of mining them to payoff the expenditures on hardware & electricity. I only made money because I held onto about half my coins. Actually I haven't made any money yet. still HODLing. Waiting & wishing for another spike. Been waiting for few years now. The bear market from 2013-2017 was depressing.

So if you're interested in mining to make money, here's my advice: DON'T mine!
Just speculate and buy the coins instead.

ESPECIALLY going into the summer. The mining profit calculators never account for extra air conditioner load. Not a problem with < 10 video cards. Even 10 cards is going to significantly add heat to your house. Cycling outside air is dusty and dirty, bad for hardware & fans. The winter time is really the only good time to mine crypto, imo.
wonder what happend are you still holding or did you sell at peak lol
 
I started mining 2 weeks ago, using 1 - 3090 running 24/7. Power consumption is about 350 watts; in my area that's about 48 cents per 24 hour period, or about $ 14 a month. Overall earnings over the 2 weeks is about $100, or $2,600 a year. Cost to build the rig was about $3,280, so I have a payback time of about 66 weeks. This is all based on today's bitcoin quote of $32,500.

Is it worth it? That's a personal judgement call. From one point of view, an investment that returns its entire buy in cost in 66 weeks, and then pays you $50 a week for life, is an obvious Yes. However, cryptocurrency is VERY volatile, and there's no guarantee that that $50 a week will remain constant. A couple of months ago, it would have been $100 a week; a year ago, $15 a week. You should not invest more money in equipment than you are prepared to write off. That said, the 3090 I bought will always be worth something. I might not get all my money back, but I'd probably get 1/3rd or 1/2. At very worst, I'd be stuck with a killer gaming card.

I've been watching Ebay prices on 3090's, and they seem to have dropped about 15% to 20% over the last month. That's a drop of perhaps $300-$400, which is more money than the card can generate in a month; so I'd continue to watch Ebay prices, and buy in when the prices have stabilized somewhat.

Bitcoin mining is a fun hobby, and occasionally profitable. But equipment right now is scarce and very expensive, and the future is VERY uncertain and unpredictable. I'd recommend watching from the sidelines, and getting in if the risk/reward ratio becomes more appealing.
3090 are a bad investment compared to other gpus tbh 2 3070 are better
 
When buying hardware I like to keep the ROI under 6 months. 6 months is an eternity in crypto and people who expect ROI, not even profit, over more than a year are taking a big risk.
 
The 3090 does not suffer from the artificial slowdown "Light Hash Rate" applied to 3060,3070, and 3080 drivers by Nvidia. The only source for graphics cards is through scalpers, and scalpers will happily send you a LHR card, knowing that they have no requirement to accept returns. The only solution to this is to buy 3090's, which are LHR free. The price for scalper cards is based entirely on the hash rate; cards that have 50% hash rate of a 3090 sell for half the price. It's a matter of faith in the community that 3090's are a 'bad investment' but I disagree. You're paying for hash rate, but you get the guarantee of no LHR slowdown for free.
yea but you can buy off of craigslist and check it yourself... you can also have bought a bunch of 1070 or somthing non 3000 but still a 3090 is good but not the best compared to other cards
 
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