Bitcoin Difficulty Hit a Record 64.68 Trillion as Mining Revenue Improved

Bitcoin’s proof-of-work difficulty rose 3.55% to a record 64.68 trillion at block 816,480 on November 12, 2023. The deterministic retarget made each unit of mining capacity less likely to win a block, even as stronger bitcoin prices and an inscription-driven fee surge were improving miners’ dollar revenue.

The block record identifies hash `0000000000000000000140f2c0090174230e2b409ce894efbbd6babfa04d6996` and a miner-supplied timestamp of 16:24:33 UTC on November 12. Its encoded target corresponds to difficulty of approximately 64,678,587,803,497, up from roughly 62,463,471,666,669 during the preceding epoch. Coinburn’s calculation from those values is 3.546%, conventionally rounded to 3.55%.

What the retarget measured

Bitcoin reassesses difficulty every 2,016 blocks. The rule compares the time represented by the preceding adjustment interval with the protocol’s target pace of roughly one block every ten minutes. When blocks arrive faster than targeted, the allowable proof-of-work target becomes harder; when they arrive more slowly, it becomes easier.

Difficulty is a dimensionless ratio relative to Bitcoin’s easiest target. It is not a direct meter reading of electricity use, machine count or instantaneous hashrate. The November 12 increase established that blocks in the completed epoch arrived quickly enough to require a harder target. It was consistent with robust mining competition, but the chain alone could not identify which operators added machines, improved uptime or benefited from ordinary variance in block discovery.

The adjustment extended a sequence of increases beginning September 19. Difficulty had risen 5.48% on September 19, 0.35% on October 3, 6.47% on October 16 and 2.35% on October 29 before the November 12 move. Each comparison concerns a discrete 2,016-block epoch, not a daily market statistic.

A tougher network met better mining revenue

Hashrate Index’s contemporaneous November 12 roundup reported that its U.S.-dollar hashprice measure—estimated daily gross mining revenue per petahash per second—reached $94.55 per PH/s during November 5–12 and stood at $82.77 per PH/s when the report was written. Its weekly average was $81.80, 14% above the preceding week’s $71.20.

That was not a statement of net profit. Hashprice combines block subsidy, transaction-fee revenue and bitcoin’s exchange value under the provider’s methodology; it excludes an operator’s electricity, equipment, hosting, financing, taxes and downtime. Hashrate Index also reported that transaction fees comprised 13.7% of total block rewards during the measured week, versus 3.1% in the prior week, as BRC-20 inscription activity intensified competition for block space.

The two forces therefore pulled in opposite directions. Higher difficulty reduced expected bitcoin production for a miner whose hashrate stayed constant, while higher fees and a stronger exchange price raised the dollar value available from successful mining. The record does not support attributing any public miner’s profitability to the retarget alone.

What November 12 established

The verified conclusion is narrow: block 816,480 activated a record difficulty of about 64.68 trillion after a 3.55% increase. Independent explorers reproduce the height, hash, timestamp, encoded target and difficulty, while contemporaneous mining publications reported the same adjustment.

Block timestamps are supplied by miners within consensus constraints and do not prove the exact second every node received the block. Estimated hashrate and hashprice are modeled measures, not protocol fields. No bitcoin spot-price return is asserted because continuous trading across venues lacks a single official close, and the reviewed evidence does not demonstrate that the retarget caused a market move.