Hashprice measures expected gross revenue from Bitcoin mining per unit of Hashrate, the speed at which mining equipment performs calculations, over a given period. It is usually quoted per day. It helps estimate revenue, not the machine’s price or the operator’s net profit.
A figure often comes with the label USD/PH/day. This means US dollars (USD) for running 1 PH/s for a full day, even though the abbreviated label omits the second. A hashrate of 1 PH/s equals 1000 TH/s. A terahash (TH) means a trillion hash calculations in which a miner searches for a suitable result for a new block. The s stands for second. TH/s and PH/s describe a rate of computation, not a single calculation. Petr must first convert his machine’s hashrate into the unit used by the chart. Otherwise he would be comparing different amounts of work and the result would be meaningless. [1]
Providers do not all use the same names. Luxor uses Hashprice for values in both BTC (the abbreviation for bitcoin) and USD. Braiins calls the bitcoin-denominated income Hashvalue and its conversion into conventional currency Hashprice. Petr cannot compare two charts by their headings alone. He needs the currency, the hashrate unit and the period. Otherwise he might confuse a change in dollar value with a change in the amount of bitcoin the same hashrate is expected to earn. [2]
BTC mining revenue depends on newly issued coins in a block, transaction fees and mining difficulty. Difficulty determines how hard it is to find a valid block: at higher difficulty, the same hashrate is expected to earn less BTC if other conditions stay unchanged. If only the BTC/USD exchange rate changes, the dollar value of revenue changes instead. The machine has not started producing more bitcoin. It is therefore useful to view bitcoin-denominated and dollar-denominated figures side by side. [1]
Transaction fees fluctuate, so an index may smooth them with an average. Luxor’s methodology describes an average over the last 144 blocks. That is not a fixed 24 hours: blocks arrive at irregular intervals. Two providers may therefore show slightly different numbers at the same moment if they process fees differently or use different exchange-rate measurements. Before interpreting a difference as a change in earning potential, check how the figure was calculated and when it was updated. [1]
Expected mining revenue and the price of renting hashrate answer different questions. The former estimates what the work earns; the latter shows what buyers pay for it in a market. Braiins distinguishes these values. If Petr finds a rental price below the index, he still does not know his final outcome. He must establish how much hashrate will actually arrive, for how long, at what fees and under which rules the mining pool will distribute rewards. A pool is a service where miners combine computing power and share rewards. [2]
Take an invented Hashprice of 50 USD per PH/s per day and a machine producing 200 TH/s. That is 0.2 PH/s, so 50 × 0.2 gives 10 USD of expected gross revenue for a full day of uninterrupted operation. This is neither a current market quote nor a promised payout. Downtime changes the result. So do fees and pool rules. [3]
A kilowatt (kW) measures power demand: how quickly the machine uses energy. A kilowatt-hour (kWh) measures the total energy consumed, the quantity billed by an electricity supplier. Keep the illustrative 50 USD, but consider 1 PH/s operating at an efficiency of 20 J/TH. That means 20 joules of energy per terahash of calculations; at this hashrate, electrical power demand is 20 kW. Over 24 hours, the equipment uses 480 kWh. Dividing revenue by consumption, 50 / 480, gives approximately 0.104 USD/kWh. This is gross revenue per unit of energy used, not profit. If electricity costs that much, none of this revenue remains for cooling, repairs or other expenses. [4]
Petr now has a revenue estimate, but his equipment decision is only beginning. He needs the electricity price, actual consumption including cooling, pool fees, servicing and other operating costs. Payback calculations must also include buying the equipment. Simply extending today’s figure across a whole year is insufficient: the exchange rate, difficulty and fees may change. It is more useful to calculate several scenarios and see when the budget stops working. Hashprice supplies an important input, not a finished business plan. [3]
For the clearest picture, read this entry together with Hashrate, Difficulty Adjustment, ASIC Efficiency, Mining, Bitcoin. The reverse links also lead from Hashrate, ASIC Efficiency, Joules per Terahash, Pool Fee.