The end of mining with the arrival of Ethereum 2.0

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The countdown to the deployment of Ethereum 2.0 continues and it seems that it will finally be launched this year. Surely you are wondering or already thinking about what to do with your Ethereum mining equipment. You have different options, and we are going to give you some ideas of what you can do when the time comes.



For those who don’t know, among the changes in Ethereum 2.0 is leaving Proof-of-Work (PoW) behind and moving on to using Proof-of-Stake (PoS). Abandoning the proof-of-work consensus spells the end of mining with graphics cards. If you have a rig, you are probably wondering what to do when the block validation system changes.

Goodbye to PoW on Ethereum, why is it being abandoned?

Two reasons are often cited for moving from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake. The first is to improve the scalability of the Ethereum network. In addition, it is indicated that PoS is a more efficient mechanism since it consumes much less energy. Both reasons are true, but really the most important is the first one.

Ethereum has experienced network congestion countless times. When talking about c congestion, it is a process in which the number of incoming transactions is greater than the number of transactions that the network can validate. It is estimated that the Ethereum blockchain can validate about 15 transactions per second.

When this figure is exceeded for a long time, the cost of commissions per transaction goes up quite a bit (so the GAS Fee goes up). There have been periods, especially during the NFT bubble, of GAS costs exceeding $100 and even $200.

For those who want to send money, exchange tokens or other operations, such as executing a smart contract, these costs are crazy.

Due to this, proof of participation has been chosen, which allows greater scalability. This means that many more transactions can be processed per second and the commissions will plummet. It is estimated that it should exceed 50,000 tx/s. As a collateral consequence, the energy consumption needed to validate transactions will also plummet.

What do I do with my Ethereum mining rig?

You are probably wondering what to do with your mining rig once we move on to Ethereum 2.0. Well, you have several options, such as:

  • Just like with gaming graphics cards, you can clean them and sell them second-hand, also, surely very easily
  • You can choose to continue mining, but in this case, Ethereum Classic, GRIN, Ravencoin, ERGO and other graphics card compatible with cryptocurrencies

It is possible that you have been looking at this second option and the profitability does not convince you in any way. Let me tell you that you are not considering that when the consensus is changed, there will be a chain of movements.

It is estimated that when Ethereum switches to its PoS consensus and sharding is done, the price may go up quite a bit. At the same time, a rise in the price of altcoins that continue to use the PoW consensus is estimated. Among the best valued, for offering fairly solid projects, are Ethereum Classic and ERGO. SERO, Conflux, Metaverse and Ubiq are other interesting projects that could increase in price.

For now, a good option is to continue mining Ethereum while it is possible. There is a possibility that the update will not be released this year as it has been delayed quite a few times. It seems that there are still quite a few things to solve at the moment, so we are pulling along and when the update arrives, we will act as we see fit.

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