Bitcoin mining difficulty falls in first adjustment of 2026

The Bitcoin mining difficulty continued to push through to new all-time highs in 2025 amid a turbulent year for the mining industry.

The Bitcoin (BTC) network mining difficulty, the relative computing challenge of adding a new block to the decentralized blockchain ledger, fell slightly to 146.4 trillion on Thursday, in the first difficulty adjustment of 2026. 

“The next Bitcoin difficulty adjustment is estimated to take place on Jan 22, 2026, 04:08:12 AM UTC, increasing the Bitcoin mining difficulty from 146.47 T to 148.20 T,” according to CoinWarz. 

Average block times are 9.88 minutes at the time of this writing, slightly below the 10-minute target, which means the next difficulty adjustment will increase slightly to align better with the target block time.

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