The Bitcoin hash rate is expected to reach 1 ZettaHash per second before the next halving event

According to CoinDesk, Bitcoin's hash rate is expected to reach 1 Zettahash (ZH/s) per second before the next halving event in about 3.5 years, putting pressure on miners and forcing them to secure cheap power deals and more efficient equipment. Even if the hash rate grows at a relatively steady pace of 20% per year, by 2027, the average hash rate could also reach this level, which is 1000 EH/s. According to data from Glassnode, since 2020, the hash rate has been growing at an average of 65% per year with a current seven-day moving average of approximately 787 EH/s.

Upon reaching 1 ZH/s, miners will need to find more creative ways to maintain operations and adapt to a more challenging market. In fact, according to a post on X on Thursday, the hash rate for a single block may have already touched upon one ZH/s per second. However due to probabilistic nature of mining , variability in block time and short-term network fluctuations , readings from individual blocks are inaccurate . The industry standard typically uses at least seven-day moving averages considering outliers and reliability.

Not only is the hash rate increasing but also difficulty in mining each block is rising as well . Since October , blockchain has undergone positive difficulty adjustments consecutively seven times with current difficulty being109.78 T . Difficulty adjusts every2016 blocks , recalibrating so that it takes roughly ten minutes mine each block.