Public interest in the ‘Bitcoin halving’ is gaining steam as Google searches for the term have now risen to their highest level in history.
According to Google Trends data, interest in the term began steadily ramping up at the start of 2024. Beginning with a score of 9 in January, interest in the “bitcoin halving’ keyphrase is now at 100, meaning it has never been higher.
The last time the Bitcoin halving became a popular search term was at the last Bitcoin halving in May 2020, at which point search interest was roughly one-third as high as today’s. Now, four years later, the next halving dwells just around the corner, estimated for April 20 according to nicehash.com.
The Bitcoin halving is a mechanism within the Bitcoin network that’s triggered every 210,000 blocks – roughly once every four years – that cuts the supply inflation rate of BTC in half. As of right now, roughly 900 BTC are mined every day, and that figure will fall to 450 BTC after the halving.
Many consider the halving to be a bullish event for Bitcoin’s price, given that it reduces the rate at which previously mined BTC is being debased. This particular halving will reduce Bitcoin’s annual inflation rate to be lower than that of gold, to which many compare the asset as a store of value and inflation hedge.
“What if an investor with unlimited capital announced a program to acquire 450 BTC daily at the market price for the next four years and hold the asset forever?” wrote Michael Saylor, executive chairman of MicroStrategy, to Twitter on Thursday regarding the halving.
“What if they increased their purchases to 675 BTC daily in 2028, and to 787.5 BTC daily in 2032?” he continued.
Many institutions are using the Bitcoin halving as a selling point to entice customers to buy BTC through their platforms. Earlier this month, TD Bank released a commercial explaining the halving as an event that crunches Bitcoin’s supply irrespective of new demand that arrives for the asset.
Coinbase also released a commercial earlier this week explaining how much the purchasing power of Bitcoin has grown between each halving event in terms of pizza.
At present, search traffic for other bitcoin-related terms like ‘buy bitcoin’ remains relatively low compared to 2017 and 2021. The term ‘Bitcoin ETF’ has also fallen substantially in traffic since January.