What is Hashrate?

Hashrate is the measure of total computational power dedicated to a proof-of-work blockchain network, quantifying how many cryptographic hash calculations can be performed per second by all miners combined, serving as a critical indicator of the network's security, mining difficulty, and the collective effort being expended to validate transactions and create new blocks.

This metric is typically expressed in hashes per second (H/s) with various prefixes to accommodate the massive scale of modern mining operations: kilohash (KH/s), megahash (MH/s), gigahash (GH/s), terahash (TH/s), petahash (PH/s), or even exahash (EH/s) for networks like Bitcoin with enormous computational resources.

A blockchain's security is directly related to its hashrate, as higher computational power makes attacks more expensive and difficult to execute, with the cost of controlling 51% of the network's hashrate (necessary for certain attacks) becoming prohibitively expensive as the metric increases.

Hashrate fluctuates based on various factors including cryptocurrency prices (which affect mining profitability), hardware innovations, electricity costs, regulatory changes, and network events like Bitcoin's halving that reduce mining rewards, creating a dynamic equilibrium between mining costs and potential rewards.

Monitoring hashrate trends provides valuable insights into the health and security of proof-of-work networks, with sustained growth generally indicating increasing security and miner confidence, while significant drops might signal reduced security or miner exodus that could affect the network's long-term viability.