Can You Make Money Mining Bitcoin at Home?

Mining a single bitcoin on your own requires an average of 266,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity in total. It takes about 7 years, with an average monthly power consumption of about 143 kWh.

So can you actually make money mining bitcoin at home on residential electricity? We compared mining profitability across countries around the world.

TL;DR;

1. ⛏️ Mining one bitcoin requires 266,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity.
2. 🏡 The average residential electricity bill needed to mine 1 bitcoin is $46,291.24.
3. 💡 Solo mining is most favorable in the Middle East and Africa, where residential electricity is cheap.
4. 🇰🇷 Mining 1 BTC in Korea costs roughly $29,000 in electricity.

The Ever-Growing Power Demand of Bitcoin Mining

When bitcoin first appeared in 2009, mining was relatively simple. Back then, you could earn dozens to hundreds of bitcoins with just a laptop and a small amount of electricity.

However, as bitcoin gained popularity and global interest grew, specialized mining machines (ASICs) were introduced, and electricity consumption has been rising sharply.

The Cost of Mining 1 BTC (Residential Electricity)

The average residential electricity bill needed to mine 1 bitcoin is $46,291.24, which is 35% higher than the average daily price of 1 BTC in July 2023 ($30,090.08).

Residential electricity rates vary widely by region, and Europe has the highest average residential electricity cost at $85,767.84.

Asia, on the other hand, has the lowest average residential electricity cost for mining 1 bitcoin, at $20,635.62. Even so, while Lebanon requires just $266.20, Japan requires as much as $64,111.02. In Korea's case, it costs roughly $29,000 in electricity.

65 Countries Where You Can Profit on Residential Electricity

Worldwide, there are only 65 countries where you can make a profit mining on residential electricity. Of these, 5 are in Europe, and 8 are in the Americas, mostly in South America and the Caribbean. Africa has 18 countries, and Asia has 34.

In some countries, even when electricity is cheap, continuous bitcoin mining can overload the power grid and cause blackouts. This happened in Iran: after legalizing bitcoin mining in 2019, Iran banned mining several times due to power shortages during summer and winter, when electricity consumption runs higher than usual. Similarly, Iceland turned down new bitcoin mining operations in 2021 because of power shortages.

The Most Profitable Countries Are in the Middle East and Africa

Globally, the countries where the residential electricity cost of mining 1 BTC is lowest, and therefore most profitable (excluding countries that ban bitcoin), are mainly in the Middle East and Africa.

Profitable Countries Where Bitcoin Is Banned

In 2017, the Central Bank of Iraq banned virtual assets. Otherwise, Iraq would also be one of the cheapest countries in which to mine bitcoin.

As of November 2021, a total of 9 countries banned the mining, trading and use of virtual assets. They are mainly located in Asia and Africa. In Asia there are 5: Bangladesh, China, Iraq, Nepal and Qatar; in Africa there are 4: Algeria, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia. In all of these countries except Morocco, you could make a profit mining 1 BTC on your own using residential electricity.

Countries Where Mining 1 BTC Is Least Profitable

The following 82 countries are where mining 1 BTC is least profitable. Among them, the 10 countries with the most expensive electricity are as follows.

Nine of these countries are in Europe, and the rise in residential electricity rates in the region is linked to the COVID-19 pandemic and growing international demand. On top of that, the 2022 heatwave and Russia's invasion of Ukraine led to gas supply disruptions in some EU member states, and electricity prices hit record highs. As a result, making a profit from bitcoin mining in Europe is almost impossible.

How Much Electricity Does Bitcoin Mining Use in One Hour?

The amount of electricity used in one hour to mine 1 BTC isn't all that large compared with household appliances. The table below compares the hourly power consumption of bitcoin mining and household appliances.

How Long It Takes to Mine One Bitcoin on Your Own

How long would it take one person to mine a single bitcoin at home? We looked at the cost of mining 1 bitcoin in 147 countries in USD per kilowatt-hour (USD/kWh).

The electricity required to mine 1 bitcoin was calculated using eight different mining machine models with different hash rates, with the average time to mine 1 BTC for each model and a mining difficulty set at 53,911,173,001,055.00.

Bitcoin's mining difficulty is adjusted after exactly 2,016 blocks have been mined, and the adjustment interval depends on the number of active participants and the total hash power in the mining network.

Electricity rates for the 147 countries were taken from globalpetrolprices.com in USD/kWh, as of December 2022. The average power consumption was multiplied by each country's electricity rate to calculate the cost of mining 1 bitcoin in that country.

Wrapping Up

That covers how much electricity it takes to mine bitcoin and what it costs on residential electricity bills. The most profitable country is Lebanon, and the least profitable is Italy.

You can make a profit mining bitcoin at home, but in Korea it costs at least about $29,000. Mining one bitcoin requires 266,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, and the global average residential electricity bill needed to mine 1 bitcoin is $46,291.24.