One in a Billion: Tiny Bitcoin Mining Device Defies Odds, Earns $206,000 Block Reward

A Bitcoin mining device with a hashrate of only 500 gigahashes per second (Gh/s) managed to mine a block on July 24, earning a reward of $206,000 in Bitcoin.

This event stands out given that the device has only a 1 in 1.1 billion chance of achieving this approximately every ten minutes.

$206,000 Block Reward

The device, named “Bitaxe,” is produced by D-Central Technologies and is approximately the size of a human hand, as showcased by the YouTube channel “How Much?”

The accomplishment was confirmed by Bitcoin mining device retailer Altair Technology through an X post.

🏆Congratulations to the miner who likely mined the first solo BTC block with a Bitaxe on @ckpooldev with ~500 Gh hashrate!

👏Props to @skot9000, @Public_Pool_BTC & @osmu_global on the project!

You can buy these proven winners here👇
🛒https://t.co/fiEPh4pRA8#WeMineBitcoin pic.twitter.com/C6D9Jj1HlR

— Altair Technology® ⛏️ (@altair_tech) July 24, 2024

On July 24, at 11:43 am UTC, Bitcoin block number 853742 was mined, earning the lucky miner a reward worth approximately $206,000 based on the current BTC price. Blockchain data from Solo CKPool revealed that a total of 2,652.36 BTC worth $176,896,079 were sent in the block, with the average transaction being 0.6093 BTC worth $40,636.53.

Solo CKPool, the node infrastructure service to which the Bitaxe was connected, earned a total reward of 3.13 BTC worth $208,751, including an additional 0.0675 BTC worth $4,501.83 paid as transaction fees from 4,353 transactions included in the block.

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Solo CKPool, as described on its website, provides “a service to allow miners to mine solo as you cannot mine directly to a Bitcoin core node.” It also emphasizes that the service is not a traditional mining pool despite its name.

1 in 1.1 Billion Odds

To put this situation into perspective, according to Bitcoin analytics platform CoinWarz, the current total hash power of the Bitcoin network stands at 551.30 exahashes per second (Eh/s), which is equivalent to 551,303,337,631,415,300,000 H/s.

This figure equates to approximately 1.1 billion times the power of the Bitaxe device. Thus, the device’s chances of mining a block roughly every ten minutes were a mere 1 in 1.1 billion.

Bitcoin mining is notoriously energy-intensive, with miners incurring electricity costs regardless of whether they successfully mine a block. This financial burden makes solo Bitcoin mining similar to a high-stakes lottery. However, for this fortunate solo miner, the gamble has undoubtedly paid off.