{"id":73029,"date":"2026-02-18T19:01:31","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T19:01:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/?p=73029"},"modified":"2026-02-18T19:01:31","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T19:01:31","slug":"bitcoin-difficulty-to-rise-14-thursday-why-the-massive-jump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/?p=73029","title":{"rendered":"Bitcoin Difficulty To Rise 14% Thursday\u2014Why The Massive Jump?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>On-chain data shows the Bitcoin network Difficulty is set for a significant jump in the upcoming adjustment. Here\u2019s what\u2019s behind it.<\/p>\n<h2>Bitcoin Difficulty To Go Up Massively In Thursday\u2019s Adjustment<\/h2>\n<p>The Bitcoin \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/bitcoin-mining-difficulty-falls-11-in-largest-drop\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener \">Difficulty<\/a>\u201d is a feature built into the blockchain that controls how hard miners will find it to mine a block on the network. The feature exists to limit the speed at which these chain validators can earn mining rewards.<\/p>\n<p>Satoshi coded in a simple rule for the network to follow: keep the block production rate constant at 10 minutes per block. Whenever miners are producing the average block in an interval faster than 10 minutes, the blockchain raises its Difficulty to bring them back to the standard rate. Similarly, them being slow forces the network to ease the metric instead.<\/p>\n<p>Changes in the Difficulty occur about every two weeks in events known as adjustments. The upcoming such event happens to be tomorrow, February 19th. Below are the details related to this adjustment from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.coinwarz.com\/mining\/bitcoin\/difficulty-chart\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">CoinWarz<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-664672 size-large aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=980&amp;resize=980%2C471\" alt=\"Bitcoin Difficulty\" width=\"980\" height=\"471\" srcset=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=1428 1428w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=640 640w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=768 768w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=980 980w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=130 130w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=750 750w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/data_cb5762.png?w=1140 1140w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 980px) 100vw, 980px\"><\/p>\n<p>As is visible, the average block time on the Bitcoin network has stood at 8.75 minutes since the previous adjustment, meaning that miners have been significantly faster than usual.<\/p>\n<p>As a result of this fast pace, the network is estimated to raise its Difficulty by more than 14% on Thursday. This is an unusually big jump for the indicator, and the reason behind it lies in equally unusual circumstances.<\/p>\n<p>In late January, a massive snow storm swept across the United States, causing disruptions to the nation\u2019s infrastructure, including the electrical grid. As a response to the extreme weather event, Bitcoin miners situated in the country curtailed their power to help ease pressure on the grid.<\/p>\n<p>Foundry USA, the world\u2019s largest BTC mining pool, saw a <a href=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/bitcoin-hashrate-foundryusa-loses-200-eh-s-us-snap\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener \">notable drop<\/a> of nearly 60% in its total computing power or \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/bitcoin-hashrate-slides-us-cold-mining-rigs-offline\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener \">Hashrate<\/a>\u201d as miners pulled back. The drop in the global Hashrate was so drastic that the Difficulty adjustment that followed led to an easing of about 11%.<\/p>\n<p>However, while the Hashrate decline was dramatic, it was never gonna be something permanent. As the below chart for the 7-day average Hashrate from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.blockchain.com\/explorer\/charts\/hash-rate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Blockchain.com<\/a> shows, the indicator has already recovered back to about the same level as on January 24th, before the snow storm took American mining machines offline.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-664679 size-large aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=980&amp;resize=980%2C424\" alt=\"Bitcoin Mining Hashrate\" width=\"980\" height=\"424\" srcset=\"https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=1388 1388w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=640 640w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=768 768w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=980 980w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=750 750w, https:\/\/bitcoinist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/chart_8a75b9.png?w=1140 1140w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 980px) 100vw, 980px\"><\/p>\n<p>The Bitcoin network had reduced its Difficulty based on the speed miners were operating at due to the reduced US capacity, but as the Hashrate has bounced back, the blockchain is now forced to correct the metric in the other direction.<\/p>\n<h2>BTC Price<\/h2>\n<p>Bitcoin has continued to move sideways recently as its price is still trading around $67,600.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.tradingview.com\/x\/vcNhe0Xj\/\" alt=\"Bitcoin Price Chart\" width=\"1486\" height=\"953\"><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On-chain data shows the Bitcoin network Difficulty is set for a significant jump in the upcoming adjustment. Here\u2019s what\u2019s behind it. Bitcoin Difficulty To Go Up Massively In Thursday\u2019s Adjustment The Bitcoin \u201cDifficulty\u201d is a feature built into the blockchain that controls how hard miners will find it to mine a block on the network. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3,4,5],"class_list":["post-73029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-crypto","tag-doge","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=73029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=73029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=73029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=73029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}