Energy hashprice: what a megawatt-hour of mining earns
Energy hashprice puts gross mining revenue beside your electricity bill. August 2026 examples show why efficiency matters before other costs.
Hashprice expresses gross mining revenue per unit of hashrate. On 17 August 2026, Hashrate Index reported $31.89 per PH/s per day. That figure alone cannot tell you whether a machine covers its costs.
Energy hashprice translates it into revenue per megawatt-hour, making it easier to compare with an electricity bill. It is a starting point for a margin calculation, not a profit forecast.
Energy hashprice is revenue per megawatt-hour
At a fixed hashprice, a more efficient miner produces more compute from each unit of energy. The report gave these revenue figures for its fleet efficiency bands:
- Under 14 J/TH — $107 per MWh
- 14 to 19 J/TH — $79 per MWh
- 19 to 25 J/TH — $59 per MWh
- 25 to 38 J/TH — $41 per MWh
To convert US dollars per MWh to US cents per kWh, divide by 10: the figures become 10.7, 7.9, 5.9 and 4.1 cents/kWh. Dividing by 1,000 instead gives dollars/kWh; for example, $107/MWh is $0.107/kWh, or 10.7 cents/kWh.
These are representative band figures, not the exact revenue of every machine in each band. Use your fleet's actual efficiency and expected pool receipts. Pool fees, cooling and other facility loads reduce what remains for electricity at the site meter; rent, staff, repairs, financing and equipment costs still have to be paid.
Two weeks earlier, on 3 August 2026, the same table read $109, $79, $60 and $41 per MWh at a hashprice of $32.10. Those two snapshots were close. They do not establish that energy hashprice is stable: changes in bitcoin price, network difficulty and transaction fees can change the revenue available to pay for power.
Efficiency changes the electricity margin
The highest reported band figure was about 2.6 times the lowest. That ratio compares the report's representative figures, not every possible pair of machines.
For a simple illustration, subtract $60/MWh of miner electricity from $107/MWh of gross revenue: $47/MWh remains before the other costs. Against $41/MWh of revenue, the same electricity costs $19/MWh more than the mining earns. A positive electricity margin alone does not recover the purchase price or make a project profitable.
An older machine can still have a positive operating margin with sufficiently low power and running costs. Replacing it can improve efficiency but requires new capital. Compare the incremental savings with that outlay instead of assuming the newest machine is always the better investment.
The early-August snapshot
The 17 August report recorded the 8 August difficulty adjustment at +0.99%, to 127.48T, and a 920 EH/s seven-day hashrate average, versus 932 EH/s in the 3 August report. Its +1.01% next-adjustment figure was an estimate as of 17 August, not a final result.
These readings describe those dates. They are neither a summary of the entire month nor a reason to hold difficulty or revenue constant over a machine's life.
For an energy owner, include the cost of usable power
Flared gas, landfill gas and curtailed generation can be candidates for mining, but their availability and alternative value must be checked. Existing gas rights, power contracts, operating restrictions or competing uses can prevent a new customer from using the resource.
A low fuel price also is not a low delivered electricity price. Include any required gas treatment, generation, electrical works, cooling, maintenance and site development, as well as the usable hours of supply. Existing equipment only reduces the budget when it is suitable, available and can be used under the agreement. The energy site service screens those questions before treating a location as an opportunity.
Run it against your own numbers
Start with the machine's expected revenue and actual power draw, then include all operating costs and the upfront cash needed. Separate a positive operating margin from recovering that capital, and compare mining with other uses of the same money.
Use the calculator to explore your assumptions. Try lower bitcoin prices, higher difficulty, more downtime and a power price above the quote. Difficulty can also fall; use a range of scenarios rather than treating either direction as certain. Check which costs the model includes and add any missing project costs to your budget. A scenario that remains positive is still conditional on its inputs.
Correction and review — 20 September 2026: The original unit-conversion explanation was incorrect: dollars/MWh are divided by 10 to obtain cents/kWh. The numerical examples were unchanged. This review also clarifies gross revenue, representative fleet bands and scenario limits. Market figures retain their original 3 and 17 August 2026 observation dates.
Sources
Working out whether machines beat buying the coin?
The comparison depends entirely on your assumptions, so we do not print one number and call it the answer. Put yours in and see where the crossover lands.