Bitcoin Mining Weekly: May 1–8, 2026
Market Overview
Bitcoin ended the week at $80,212, down 0.9% over the final 24 hours but well above where it started the period. The price recovery above the $80,000 threshold that began in early May carried real significance for miners: at current difficulty, $80,000 BTC translates into positive economics for most modern hardware. Sentiment across the mining industry shifted from cautious to measured optimism as the week progressed, with institutional flows into Bitcoin ETFs adding to the constructive backdrop.
Hashprice Index
Hashprice — the revenue a miner earns per unit of hashrate — rose +2.5% over the seven-day period, closing at $37.14 per PH/day (46.32 sat/TH/day), up from $36.22 at the start of the week. The week's peak reached $38.95/PH/day on May 6, driven by a combination of BTC price appreciation and a brief compression in network hashrate.
Two factors pushed hashprice higher. First, Bitcoin's recovery above $80,000 directly expanded the dollar value of block rewards and transaction fees. Second, network hashrate dipped below the 1 ZH/s mark early in the week, reducing competitive pressure and temporarily boosting per-unit returns. The hashprice gave back some gains late in the period as hashrate stabilized, but the weekly trend remained positive.
Daily weighted hashprice progression for the week: $34.99 (May 1) → $36.03 (May 2) → $36.11 (May 3) → $36.74 (May 4) → $37.34 (May 5) → $37.61 (May 6) → $37.15 (May 7).
Network Stats
Bitcoin's network hashrate stood at 978.21 EH/s as of the end of the measurement period, with the current block height at 947,520. Difficulty is set at 132.47 trillion (132,472,011,079,030), reflecting a modest prior easing that has kept block times close to the 10-minute target. Average block time for the week was 591 seconds, slightly above the 600-second target — suggesting the network is running marginally under the hashrate assumed by the current difficulty setting.
The next difficulty adjustment is estimated at +1.6%, targeting May 15, 2026, which would bring difficulty to approximately 134.6 trillion. Daily emission remains at 450 BTC/day ($36.1 million at current prices), a figure that will hold until the next halving. With 102,480 blocks remaining to the halving, that event is approximately two years away.
Real Yield Rankings
Real yield measures what miners actually received per terahash per day — the net payout after fees, variance, and any pool efficiency factors — rather than the theoretical hashprice. This week's top five pools by real yield, based on May 7 data:
- Headframe — 47.186 sat/TH/day (0.9% fee, FPPS)
- Luxor — 46.513 sat/TH/day (2.5% fee, FPPS)
- TrustPool — 46.12 sat/TH/day (1.0% fee, PPS+)
- 21Pool — 45.872 sat/TH/day (4.0% fee, FPPS)
- SpiderPool — 45.862 sat/TH/day (4.0% fee, FPPS)
With the network hashprice at 46.32 sat/TH/day, the top performers are delivering above-benchmark payouts. Headframe's 47.186 sat/TH/day is notable given its low 0.9% fee structure. The spread between the top and fifth-ranked pool is just 1.32 sat/TH/day, indicating relatively tight competition in payout efficiency this week. Pools charging 4% fees — such as 21Pool and SpiderPool — appear in the top five because their underlying settlement efficiency offsets the higher take rate.
Pool Landscape
The top 10 pools by hashrate share, covering the current measurement period across 114 active pools:
- Foundry USA — 307.1 EH/s (31.7%)
- AntPool — 151.2 EH/s (15.6%)
- ViaBTC — 100.8 EH/s (10.4%)
- SpiderPool — 95.2 EH/s (9.8%)
- F2Pool — 90.5 EH/s (9.4%)
- SECPOOL — 60.7 EH/s (6.3%)
- MARA Pool — 50.4 EH/s (5.2%)
- Luxor — 28.9 EH/s (3.0%)
- SBI Crypto — 22.4 EH/s (2.3%)
- OCEAN — 18.7 EH/s (1.9%)
Foundry USA retains its dominant position at nearly one-third of total network hashrate. The combined top-three — Foundry, AntPool, and ViaBTC — account for 57.7% of hashrate, continuing the concentration trend that has persisted since the 2024 halving. SpiderPool climbed above F2Pool in this period, with both hovering close to the 95–91 EH/s band. SECPOOL at 60.7 EH/s holds a meaningful sixth-place position. At the lower end of the top ten, OCEAN's 18.7 EH/s represents the TIDES payout model, which distributes rewards differently than standard FPPS or PPS+ structures.
Mining News Highlights
Gomining Unveils GoBTC Payment Protocol at Consensus Miami
Gomining, ranked among the world's top-10 Bitcoin miners by capacity and serving five million users, introduced the GoBTC open payment protocol at Consensus Miami 2026. The protocol offers instant transaction authorization for merchants with on-chain Bitcoin settlement promised within 12 hours and a zero-fee structure for the merchant side. The launch positions Gomining in the payments infrastructure space alongside its mining operations, and reflects a broader trend of large mining operators diversifying into adjacent fintech products.
Colombian President Links Bitcoin Mining to Caribbean Coast Development
Colombian President Gustavo Petro made remarks this week suggesting that Bitcoin mining could serve as a catalyst for economic development along Colombia's Caribbean coast. The statement frames mining as a potential driver of regional investment and employment in an area with available energy resources. While the remarks were not accompanied by a formal policy proposal, they add Colombia to the list of Latin American governments publicly engaging with Bitcoin mining as a development tool, joining El Salvador and Paraguay.
Hut 8 Cuts Borrowing Cost with $200M FalconX Refinancing
Hut 8 replaced its existing Coinbase credit facility with a new $200 million bitcoin-backed loan from FalconX, reducing its fixed interest rate from 9% to 7% — a 200-basis-point improvement. The refinancing released approximately 3,300 BTC (worth roughly $260 million at early-May prices) that had been pledged as collateral under the previous arrangement. The move reduces Hut 8's carrying cost on secured debt and frees up collateral that can now be redeployed or held as unrestricted treasury. For miners managing leveraged balance sheets, lower borrowing rates at current hashprice levels meaningfully improve cash flow margins.
Bitcoin ETFs Draw $163M in Weekly Inflows, IBIT Leads
U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded net inflows of $163 million for the week ended May 5, with BlackRock's IBIT identified as the primary driver. Flows were uneven — weak early in the week, then recovering sharply in the final sessions. The sustained institutional demand reflected in ETF flows has become a meaningful structural support for Bitcoin's price, and by extension for mining economics. When ETF inflows persist alongside recovering BTC prices, the hashprice correlation tends to follow.
Looking Ahead
The next difficulty adjustment is projected at +1.6%, expected around May 15, 2026. If realized, it will push difficulty to approximately 134.6 trillion — a modest tightening that should have limited impact on hashprice at current BTC levels, assuming hashrate remains stable. Miners operating near the efficiency threshold should model the adjustment into their breakeven calculations.
Bitcoin's price stability above $80,000 remains the key variable for the next week. Continued ETF inflows and improving market sentiment could push BTC higher, providing further support to hashprice. Conversely, any macro-driven selloff that breaks below $78,000–$79,000 would put pressure on marginal miners. The average block time of 591 seconds suggests network hashrate may edge up modestly before the adjustment, which would suppress per-unit yields slightly even with flat BTC prices.
With 114 active pools competing for block rewards and the top-five real yield pools clustered within 1.5 sat/TH/day of each other, pool selection continues to matter at the margin. Miners evaluating pool efficiency can track live real yield data across all active pools.