Crypto mining ROI calculator

For most miners, the real make-or-break question isn’t “how many coins will I get today?” It’s “what will this machine cost me to run?” If your payout cannot cover your electricity bill at your actual wall power and your real €/kWh or $/kWh, then the setup is structurally unprofitable—whether you mine with a CPU, a GPU, or an ASIC. This crypto mining ROI calculator is built for that reality check. It estimates daily and monthly energy usage, converts that into electricity cost, and shows the minimum daily revenue needed to break even on power. If you also paste an expected yield (coins/day) and enter a coin price, the calculator expands the view to revenue, profit, and (optionally) a simple payback time. In a few inputs you get a grounded snapshot of whether your rig is likely to earn, break even, or simply turn electricity into heat.

Why coins per day alone isn’t enough

It’s tempting to think mining works like a vending machine: turn it on, coins come out, sell them, profit. In practice, mining profitability shifts constantly because the most volatile parts of the system are usually not your hardware, but the network and the market around it:

• network difficulty and total hashrate change,

• block rewards and emission schedules evolve,

• pool fees and payout schemes differ,

• coin prices swing sharply up or down.

That’s why a sensible decision starts with the most “anchored” input: electricity cost and the power break-even point. If the power math is already ugly, everything else becomes a gamble. The calculator is designed to prioritize that baseline first, and only then layer profit and ROI on top when you provide yield and price.

What the calculator estimates at a glance

Think of the output as three levels of detail:

• Energy and cost: how many kWh you burn, and what it costs per day and per month.

• Break-even thresholds: the minimum daily revenue needed to avoid paying power out of pocket (in fiat), and optionally the break-even yield in coins/day.

• Profit and payback: revenue and profit once you enter yield and price, plus an optional simple payback time when hardware cost is provided.

This structure is intentional: even if you don’t know yield yet, you can still answer the most important question—“how expensive is it to run this thing?”

How the calculator works

Electricity cost and break-even

Start by selecting a machine profile (office PC, gamer PC, mining rig, ASIC, or custom). Each profile assumes a typical load power draw in watts. Then you enter:

• electricity price (€/kWh or $/kWh),

• uptime (%), to reflect part-time mining vs 24/7 operation.

From there, the baseline math is straightforward:

kWh/day = (W / 1000) × 24 × uptime

Then daily electricity cost:

power cost/day = kWh/day × price per kWh

Your fiat break-even is essentially the same number: it’s the minimum daily revenue required just to pay the power bill.

Revenue, profit, and simple ROI

If you also enter:

• expected yield in coin/day (e.g., 0.01 ETC/day), and

• coin price in your selected fiat currency,

the calculator computes:

revenue/day = coin/day × price/coin
profit/day = revenue/day − power cost/day
profit/30 days = profit/day × 30 (a practical approximation)

If you additionally enter a hardware cost, it can estimate simple payback time:

ROI (days) = hardware cost / profit/day (only when profit is positive)

This model is intentionally simplified. It does not automatically price in depreciation, cooling overhead, maintenance, tax, or long-term difficulty growth. The tradeoff is speed and clarity—perfect for identifying setups that are unworkable even before you start worrying about the finer details.

What expected yield means and where to get it

In this calculator, expected yield means an estimated payout in coins per day. Common sources include:

• mining pool dashboards (often show “estimated earnings” in coins/day or fiat/day),

• mining profitability calculators (which estimate coin/day from hashrate, power, fees, and difficulty).

If you want to keep the workflow simple for users who don’t know hashrate, the easiest pattern is:

1. Choose a machine profile and set electricity price.

2. Pick the coin you’re considering.

3. Copy the pool’s “estimated coins/day” value (or a calculator’s coins/day estimate).

4. Enter current coin price.

5. Read revenue, profit, and payback.

And if someone can’t find yield at all, the baseline view still helps: it shows what they are guaranteed to spend on electricity and what revenue/day would be required to break even.

Two ways to define break-even

The calculator supports two useful break-even perspectives.

Fiat break-even

This is universal and does not require choosing a coin. It answers:

“How much money per day must this setup earn to stop losing money on electricity?”

If you only want a sanity check, fiat break-even is often enough.

Coin break-even

If coin price is known, you can translate power cost into a required yield:

coin break-even = power cost/day ÷ price/coin

This is a powerful filter. If a pool estimate consistently reports coins/day below your coin break-even, the setup isn’t profitable as a business under current conditions—no matter how exciting the coin seems.

Why electricity is usually the dominant mining cost

Electricity tends to be the harshest cost in mining because it’s:

• continuous (you pay every hour you run),

• immediate (the bill arrives even if profitability collapses),

• close to linear (roughly double the watts = roughly double the cost).

This is why mining is often described as running an electric heater that also produces coins. The “free heating” argument can be partly valid—but only if mining genuinely replaces heating you would otherwise pay for, and you aren’t mining in warm months while also paying for air conditioning.

Power estimation pitfalls and how to get better numbers

Preset wattage values are convenient, but real-world power draw varies widely.

Why real power draw differs

• undervolt/underclock can reduce power by 10–30% in many GPU scenarios with only modest performance loss,

• PSU efficiency changes the “wall power” you actually pay for,

• system overhead adds up (motherboard, CPU, RAM, fans, risers, drives),

• cooling choices affect power (fan count, RPM, pump power),

• ASIC models vary dramatically in wattage per unit.

Best practice

If ROI accuracy matters, measure total wall power with a plug-in power meter. That number is more trustworthy than software-reported “board power” and it includes everything you pay for.

Uptime and part-time mining

Not everyone mines 24/7. Many people mine:

• overnight (especially with time-of-use tariffs),

• on weekends,

• only when their PC would already be running.

Uptime matters because both cost and revenue scale roughly with runtime. Lower uptime reduces daily costs, but it also reduces earnings—and usually extends payback time if you’re aiming for ROI.

If your electricity price differs day vs night, you can either:

• run two quick calculations (day rate vs night rate), or

• enter a weighted average electricity price that matches your monthly bill more closely.

Revenue vs profit and why gross earnings mislead

Revenue is not profit. Profit is what remains after costs.

This calculator includes the minimum unavoidable cost: electricity. In reality, other drains often include:

• pool fees (commonly ~1–2%),

• exchange fees when converting to fiat,

• payout/withdrawal fees,

• downtime from crashes, reboots, or pool/network issues,

• maintenance (dust, fans, thermal paste),

• depreciation and resale value loss,

• cooling overhead (especially if air conditioning is needed),

• taxes, depending on jurisdiction.

That’s why “slightly positive” results are fragile: small overheads can flip them negative. Treat thin margins with skepticism.

ROI and why long payback times are risky

Simple ROI (hardware cost ÷ profit/day) is useful, but it’s easy to misunderstand.

• It is not guaranteed: difficulty can rise, yield can fall, price can drop.

• It ignores depreciation: hardware value can decline quickly, and used markets are cyclical.

• It ignores operational friction: downtime and maintenance happen.

• It ignores opportunity cost: sometimes buying the coin directly outperforms mining.

A practical rule: the longer the payback time, the more “moving parts” can change before you reach it. Risk increases sharply as ROI stretches out.

Coin choice and what makes something mineable

A coin is “mineable” in the classic sense when it relies on Proof of Work (PoW) or PoW-like mechanisms, where miners compete with computation to produce blocks and earn rewards (plus transaction fees).

When evaluating a coin for mining, beginners should watch:

• which hardware dominates (CPU/GPU/ASIC),

• how fast difficulty/total hashrate grows,

• pool availability and payout options,

• liquidity (how easily it can be sold),

• volatility (how wildly price moves).

In any “easy mode” calculator, coin lists work best as categories (CPU-oriented, GPU-oriented, ASIC-dominated). The most realistic yield input still comes from your pool or a dedicated mining profitability tool.

Pools, variance, and why earnings fluctuate

Mining payouts rarely form a smooth line:

• blocks can arrive in bursts,

• pool payout schemes differ (PPS, PPLNS, etc.),

• “pool luck” fluctuates.

That’s why coins/day can swing over short windows and becomes more stable on weekly or monthly averages. If you want more robust inputs, use a 7-day average yield (or test both a “good week” and a “bad week” yield).

Difficulty and hashrate dynamics

Difficulty and network hashrate capture how competitive a network is. If more miners or more powerful miners join, your share of rewards shrinks—even when your machine stays identical.

This is the classic mining feedback loop: when a coin becomes more profitable, miners pile in, hashrate rises, and coins/day often drops. Planning ROI on today’s yield as if it will remain constant for months is risky, especially for long payback horizons.

Price strategy: profit today or speculation later

Most miners fall into one of two styles:

Immediate sell

You convert mined coins to fiat regularly. Your results track current mining economics and are less dependent on long-term price forecasts.

Hold (hodl)

You keep mined coins hoping price rises. This turns mining into a hybrid of mining economics and speculation. You might be unprofitable today on electricity, but later profit if price increases enough.

The calculator supports both approaches: enter today’s price to evaluate current profitability, or test a “target price” to see what price level would make the setup attractive.

Hardware categories in the real world

Cpu mining

Often low efficiency and low returns. It can make sense if the machine must run anyway (server/NAS/office PC) and incremental power draw is small.

Gpu mining

The classic home mining platform. Profitability depends heavily on tuning (undervolt, memory/core clocks, fan curve). GPUs are flexible (you can switch coins/algorithms), but the physical downsides—heat, noise, space—are real.

Asic mining

Efficient for a specific algorithm, but often loud and power-hungry. Great with cheap electricity and a competitive model, but less flexible and can become obsolete quickly if the network evolves or newer hardware dominates.

Preset profiles help because they quickly show scale: a ~450 W gamer PC and a ~3000 W ASIC live in completely different electricity cost realities.

Cooling, noise, and other hidden costs

Mining is not just a spreadsheet exercise; it’s a physical project. People often “discover” this when:

• room temperature rises noticeably,

• fans run constantly,

• dust builds up faster,

• power distribution and cable safety become serious.

Hidden costs can include:

• additional fans and airflow upgrades,

• higher AC usage in summer,

• noise mitigation (which can worsen cooling),

• time spent on stability and maintenance.

Because the calculator doesn’t price these in, treat thin profits cautiously. If your computed profit is small, one real-world factor can erase it.

Taxes and legal considerations

Tax treatment varies widely by country and may depend on:

• whether mining is treated as income,

• whether trading gains are taxable,

• when gains are considered realized (sale/withdrawal/fiat conversion).

So treat “profit” as closer to a pre-tax figure unless you know your local rules. If you mine at meaningful scale, professional advice can prevent costly mistakes.

Step-by-step usage guide

1. Select your machine
   Use a preset for speed. For accuracy, measure wall power and use a custom value.

2. Enter electricity price
   Use an effective €/kWh or $/kWh that resembles what you actually pay on your bill.

3. Set uptime
   Part-time mining changes cost and revenue immediately.

4. Check fiat break-even
   This is the minimum daily revenue needed to avoid losing money on power.

5. Get expected yield (coins/day)
   Copy from your pool’s estimate or a profitability calculator. Prefer a 7-day average.

6. Enter coin price
   Use today’s price or a test price if you’re evaluating a speculative hold strategy.

7. Interpret profit and ROI carefully
   Mentally subtract hidden overhead and consider risk—especially when ROI is long.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Underestimating power draw (measure at the wall if possible).

• Underestimating electricity price (use an effective all-in cost close to the bill).

• Making decisions from a single day’s earnings (variance matters).

• Treating long ROI as stable (difficulty and price change).

• Ignoring heat and noise (especially in summer when cooling costs rise).

• Relying on “I’ll sell later at a higher price” as if it’s guaranteed.

Simple sensitivity testing

If you’re uncertain, don’t trust one set of inputs. Instead:

• test a “bad week” vs “good week” yield,

• test current price vs a pessimistic price.

If the setup flips negative easily, it’s fragile. If it stays meaningfully profitable across scenarios, it’s more robust.

When mining can make sense and when it usually doesn’t

Mining is more likely to make sense when electricity is cheap, hardware efficiency is strong, you can tune (especially undervolting GPUs), yields remain comfortably above break-even, and payback isn’t extremely long.

Mining is more likely to be a bad deal when power is expensive, general-purpose PCs are aimed at ASIC-dominated coins, the profit margin is tiny, or heat/noise constraints force low uptime.