XBT difficulty set to jump about 20% next week

XBT's next difficulty adjustment is shaping up to be a big one. Blocks have been arriving every 8 minutes 20 seconds on average, well under the 10-minute target, so the network is on track to raise difficulty by about 20% at block 977,760, roughly 1,370 blocks away. At the current pace that lands around Oct 17.

It would be the second large step in a row. The last retarget raised difficulty by 10%.

Why it's happening

Hash rate keeps arriving faster than difficulty can follow. The network is running at about 43.5 PH/s. Every 2,016 blocks, difficulty resets so blocks go back to arriving every 10 minutes on average. More hash means faster blocks, and faster blocks mean a bigger jump.

What it means for miners

• Fewer coins per machine. If price and hash rate stay where they are, each TH/s earns about a sixth less after the retarget (1 / 1.20 = 0.83). Hash price sits around $10.79 per TH/s per day today.
• Margins are still wide. At $0.13/kWh, a 19 TH/s BLAKE2b machine would still clear about $160 a day on today's numbers after a 20% step. Run your own machine in the mining calculator.
• The estimate moves. It's based on recent block times and will shift as hash rate comes and goes. Watch it live on the home page.

Difficulty chartHash price chart

Data from XBT block explorers via xbt.live, as of Oct 9, 2026. Estimates only, not financial advice.