Bitcoin’s network hashrate has spent 316 consecutive days below its all-time high as mining companies increasingly pivot power resources toward artificial intelligence. On August 31, the seven-day average hashrate sat near 914 exahashes per second (EH/s), representing a 20.6% drop from its peak of 1,151.6 EH/s in October 2025. This mark-free stretch represents the longest period without a new record in ten years, surpassing the previous decade-long high of 252 days recorded in the same Blockchain.com data series.
This prolonged slump is the result of several months of challenging mining economics, seasonal power curtailments during the summer, and a strategic pivot by multiple operators toward high-performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence. Raphael Zagury, CEO of Twenty One Capital, has characterized this phase as the first prolonged “economic hashrate bear market” in Bitcoin’s history.
This categorization is particularly notable because the price of Bitcoin has already experienced the type of recovery that traditionally triggers a mining resurgence. From late June to late August, BTC surged 34.9% to top $81,000, even as the network’s hashrate dropped by 10.1% during the same window. This marks only the second time such a divergence has occurred since 2012.
Normally, rising Bitcoin prices lift the fiat value of block rewards, incentivizing miners to turn back on rigs that had been rendered unprofitable. This time, however, the response has been remarkably muted. The key difference in the current cycle is that the energy and data-center capacity moving away from Bitcoin mining now has viable alternative destinations.
Bitcoin’s rally has not brought enough machines back
Standard indicators of a mining recovery are beginning to surface. VanEck estimated the network’s hashrate at approximately 885 EH/s during the week ending August 11, with mining difficulty sitting 18.3% below its November 2025 peak. This represented the sharpest drop in difficulty since the Chinese mining ban of 2021.
Meanwhile, the Puell Multiple—which evaluates the dollar value of daily Bitcoin issuance against its one-year average—hovered around 0.73 over the prior 30 days, placing it in the 16th percentile and highlighting remarkably depressed revenue conditions for miners.
These financial strains pushed less efficient rigs offline. In response, the Bitcoin network functioned exactly as designed.
When hashpower drops, the protocol automatically lowers mining difficulty, allowing the remaining participants to secure the same block rewards with less computational effort. The resulting boost to profit margins typically coaxes offline hardware back onto the network.
Signs of this classic rebound began to manifest in August. VanEck noted that the August 8 difficulty adjustment climbed by 1%, marking the first upward shift in its tracked sequence as hashrate climbed back toward 925 EH/s. A subsequent 1.31% drop in difficulty on August 23 provided further operational relief.
By August 31, the Hashrate Index reported the seven-day hashrate at 915 EH/s, representing a 3.3% increase from the 886 EH/s recorded a week prior. Block times averaged 9 minutes and 56 seconds, aligning almost perfectly with the network’s 10-minute target.
Hashprice also rebounded to $39.36 per petahash per second per day (PH/s/day), climbing above its 30-day average of $34.63.
Under normal circumstances, this trifecta of a roughly 35% price rally, decreased difficulty, and improved hashprice would strongly encourage operators to power up their machines. Yet, the overall hashrate remains well below its historical peak.
AI changes what happens after a miner switches off
For several operators, turning off Bitcoin mining rigs is no longer a temporary pause while waiting for profit margins to improve.
For instance, IREN scaled back its installed self-mining capacity from 50 EH/s in June 2025 to 23.2 EH/s by June 2026, decommissioning older hardware and repurposing its power and data-center assets for AI Cloud Services. By the end of June, the company had roughly 40 megawatts (MW) of AI Cloud capacity up and running.
Similarly, TeraWulf has transitioned substantial operating capacity toward high-performance computing. The firm reported 81 MW of critical IT capacity on June 30, with 102 MW energized in July, alongside 145 MW of legacy Bitcoin mining capacity.
Highlighting the long-term nature of these commitments, Riot Platforms secured a 20-year hosting agreement worth approximately $9 billion with Anthropic in August.
These long-term commitments alter the fundamental economics of a mining recovery. While a rig turned off due to a falling hashprice can easily be powered back on when conditions improve, electricity contracted to a long-term AI client cannot be easily reclaimed, regardless of how high Bitcoin’s price climbs or how low its difficulty drops.
AI developers find the mining sector highly attractive due to years of infrastructure development. Miners hold substantial power allocations, grid connections, and data-center facilities engineered for high-density computing workloads.
While this structural shift is not the sole cause of the hashrate decline—seasonal grid curtailments, particularly in Texas, and the retirement of inefficient machines also played major roles—AI is redefining what happens to that capacity once it goes offline.
Better mining economics now have to compete with AI
The next stage of the network’s hashrate recovery will clarify how much hashing power was simply turned off temporarily versus how much has permanently migrated to other sectors.
Some operators are continuing to expand their mining footprints. MARA reported 70.3 EH/s of energized hashrate as of June 30, while Bitdeer’s self-mining capacity reached 76.7 EH/s in July. Riot also grew its active mining capacity to 44.4 EH/s, up from 38.5 EH/s, even as it pursued AI opportunities.
| Company | Observed operating signal | Implication for hashrate recovery |
|---|---|---|
| IREN | Mining capacity dropped from 50 EH/s to 23.2 EH/s; roughly 40 MW of AI Cloud capacity was active as of June 30 | Repurposed infrastructure is unlikely to return to mining based on difficulty adjustments alone |
| TeraWulf | Energized 102 MW of critical IT capacity in July, alongside 145 MW of legacy mining capacity | HPC workloads can absorb operational capacity while mining activities continue |
| Riot | Deployed mining capacity grew from 38.5 EH/s to 44.4 EH/s while delivering 25 MW of critical IT capacity | AI infrastructure and Bitcoin mining can scale simultaneously |
| MARA | Energized hashrate reached 70.3 EH/s by June 30 | Large-scale mining expansion is still actively occurring |
| Bitdeer | Self-mining hashrate hit 76.7 EH/s in July | New mining hardware continues to join the network |
This split divides the sector into three camps: companies aggressively scaling up their Bitcoin hardware, those shifting their infrastructure to serve computing clients, and those attempting to straddle both industries.
Bitcoin’s self-correcting design remains fully operational. Difficulty continues to adjust dynamically, block times remain near their target, and the recent climb back toward 915 EH/s proves that some hashpower is returning.
However, the 316-day drought indicates that this return of computing power has not been strong enough to match the network’s late-2025 high.
The ultimate question is whether rising Bitcoin prices, an improved hashprice, and favorable difficulty adjustments can draw enough idle hardware back to break the drought.
If they fail to do so, the primary obstacle may lie outside the crypto ecosystem: a portion of the infrastructure that once waited for the next mining bull run is now locked into more lucrative contracts elsewhere.
