How Many Bitcoins Are There? (2023 Overview)
Ever since its inception in 2009, bitcoin has been a consistently trending topic worldwide. But just how many of them are there and how fast are they mined?! Is there a cap to the number of bitcoins available and can this digital currency be lost?! Read on to find out!
How Many Bitcoins Are There?
At the time of writing, there are a little over 19 million bitcoins in existence, with the exact figure standing at 19,103 million. The number of bitcoins changes by the day, as a little under a thousand new ones are mined a day, bringing this figure closer to its peak by the hour!
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Insightful Data on Bitcoin Mining, Circulation, and Limits
When observing the number of BTC in circulation, it’s inevitable to go through data on its mining and how much it contributes towards the grand total, when the total number of bitcoins will be in circulation, how many have been lost, and more.
There are over 19.103 million circulating bitcoins.
Historical data points to a mere 50 bitcoins having existed on January 3rd, 2009. A figure that skyrocketed to 1.641 million on the same date a year later.
(Blockchain.com)
The maximum number of bitcoins that can be mined is capped at 21 million.
The BTC supply is finite and embedded into its protocol. Its mining reward is halved every 210,000 blocks (or a time span of approximately four years) and is gradually decreasing over time.
(Blockchain.com)
There are 1,946,212.5 bitcoins left to mine.
Considering the current state of circulating BTC, its supply cap, and the tempo of mining (more on which is discussed below), one might assume we’re getting closer to the day when the last bitcoin will be mined. The math behind it is not that simple though!
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The bitcoin mining end date is estimated to be sometime in 2140.
As mentioned above, BTC’s mining rewards are divided by two every four years, with the next halving date estimated to be in the first quarter of 2024. And based on the current mining tempo and rewards, we’re well over 100 years away from seeing the last bitcoin mined.
(The Indian Express)
There are currently 6.25 bitcoins per block.
Upon its launch in 2009, mining rewards stood at 50 bitcoins per block. Through halving and the tempo in which bitcoins are mined nowadays, it’s estimated that verifying a block of transactions will grant miners a total amount of bitcoins of 1.56.
(The Indian Express)
There are likely over a million bitcoin miners around the world.
This figure is estimated based on the total network hashrate, or the 24-hour performance of the bitcoin network expressed in number of hashes per second.
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Each bitcoin block takes ten minutes to mine.
Considering that, at the time of writing, only a little over six of them are needed to be rewarded an actual bitcoin, one might assume that a bitcoin takes ten minutes to mine. That would not only bring us closer to reaching the bitcoin supply limit, but it would also mean that sourcing bitcoins is rather easy – which couldn’t be further from the truth.
(Gfinity Esports)
Bitcoin hashrate stands at 238.57 EH/s.
This further increases the mining difficulty, pushing the opportunity of mining the total bitcoin supply further into the future. Considering the size of computing power needed to solve a block, miners typically join pools where they share computing power and split profits in proportion to their contributions.
(CoinWarz, Gfinity Esports)
The number of bitcoins mined per day stands at 900.
This figure wouldn’t have been possible if miners hadn’t joined pools. The largest pools in the bitcoin network as of May 2022, are Foundry USA, F2Pool, and AntPool, accounting for 20.8%, 14.4%, and 13.9% of the total hashrate share, respectively.
(Gfinity Esports, BTC.com)
Just 0.1% of miners control 50% of mining capacity.
While there’s no such thing as a bitcoin mining limit to be hit, data further points to the top 10% of miners controlling 90% of mining capacity. Such high concentration makes the network vulnerable to a 51% attack.
(Fortune)
Miners won’t receive any block rewards once all bitcoins are mined.
Once the number of bitcoins in circulation has reached its peak, miners won’t be able to receive any block-mining rewards. They will, however, be able to earn rewards in the form of transaction-processing fees. This will ultimately depend on the way bitcoin evolves as a cryptocurrency by the time the bitcoin cap limit is reached.
(Investopedia)
Between 2.78 million and 3.79 million bitcoins have been lost.
While losing cryptocurrency might sound counterintuitive, it definitely is an occurrence, and one at a large scale while at it! When compared to the amount of bitcoin in circulation, the above figure accounts for over 17% of the total. Still, it’s estimated that around 2.5% of lost bitcoins might be recoverable.
(Bankrate)
Bitcoin’s Bright Future
Regardless of its price fluctuations and trading volume, bitcoin remains reigning supreme in the world of cryptocurrencies. With the number of total bitcoins in circulation increasing by the day and the digital currency’s widening adoption, bitcoin shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
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