Over the past nine months, the realized hash rate of a group of public Bitcoin miners, excluding Bitdeer, has fallen by 21.2%, according to MinerWeekly.
The combined hash rate decreased from 368.3 EH/s in the fourth quarter of 2025 to 319.0 EH/s in the second quarter of 2026.
Companies mining the leading cryptocurrency are reducing their capacities to shift them to AI and HPC infrastructure, analysts from the publication claim.
The overall Bitcoin network’s hash rate declined more modestly. The average quarterly hash rate was 1,071 EH/s in the fourth quarter of 2025, 993 EH/s in the first quarter of 2026, and 957 EH/s in the second quarter.
The total decrease was only 10.6%, with Bitdeer being a key factor in this difference.
MinerWeekly noted that some companies were reducing mining operations faster than others could increase their capacities.
Conversely, Bitdeer compensated for the declines, with its realized hash rate increasing by 44% to 63 EH/s.
Reasons for the Decline
The authors attribute the shift to increased revenue from colocation and computing infrastructure for AI. In the second quarter, Core Scientific earned $136.7 million from additional placements compared to $27.5 million from Bitcoin mining.
TeraWulf’s revenue from HPC rentals reached $31.9 million (71% of the total), while mining brought in $12.8 million.
Other miners showed a weaker transition. Riot Platforms reported $23.2 million in revenue from data centers versus $113.7 million from mining. Bitdeer earned $14 million from cloud AI services and $197.1 million from mining-related activities.
Hut 8 and MARA indicated a smaller contribution from computing services, while Cipher and Keel Infrastructure have yet to record HPC revenue.
Experts described the current downturn as a result of weak mining economics and competition for capital and electricity from AI workloads.
MinerWeekly recalled that after China’s mining ban in June 2021, the network’s hash rate temporarily fell to 57.5 EH/s and nearly recovered by December.
In August 2026, Bitcoin miners’ revenue from fees dropped to a 10-year low.
