What is Bitcoin halving?
Bitcoin’s protocol halves the block reward (a.k.a. block subsidy) every 210,000 blocks—roughly every four years—to regulate issuance and enforce digital scarcity. The reward started at 50 BTC per block and has progressed as 50 → 25 → 12.5 → 6.25 → 3.125 → 1.5625 → …, trending toward zero. Using a long-run average of about 144 blocks/day, new supply in the current epoch is roughly 3.125 × 144 ≈ 450 BTC/day; after the next halving it will be about 225 BTC/day. Miner revenue equals block reward + transaction fees, with fees fluctuating as network congestion and demand change.
Dates in a “halving schedule” are estimates based on block height and the average block interval, so they can shift slightly with hashrate and difficulty. The current epoch began on 2024-04-20 at height 840,000 with a reward of 3.125 BTC; the next halving is expected around height 1,050,000 (≈2028), subject to mainnet block production.