The short answer
Hashrate is mining speed: how many attempts to find a solution (hashes) a device makes per second. The higher it is, the bigger the miner’s share of the rewards and the higher the income. But hashrate can only be compared within one algorithm: 300 TH/s on a graphics card and 20 KH/s on a processor are different kinds of “miles”, and it is fairer to compare them by income in dollars.
What a hash is and why miners compute it
Imagine a lottery where you don’t buy the winning ticket — you have to guess it. The cryptocurrency network sets a puzzle, and miners try answer after answer. Each attempt means computing a hash: a short “fingerprint” of data that can’t be predicted in advance, only calculated.
Whoever finds a suitable hash first gets the block reward. A home computer working alone would be guessing for years, so miners join pools: a pool shares the rewards among participants in proportion to the work they have done. Hashrate is the measure of that work — the number of attempts per second.
Units: H/s, KH/s, MH/s, GH/s, TH/s
The prefixes are the same as for bytes and hertz: each one is a thousand times larger than the one before.
| Unit | Name | Hashes per second | Where you see it |
|---|---|---|---|
| H/s | hash per second | 1 | the base unit |
| KH/s | kilohash | 1,000 | CPUs on Monero (RandomX) |
| MH/s | megahash | 1,000,000 | GPUs on older algorithms |
| GH/s | gigahash | 10⁹ | outdated ASICs |
| TH/s | terahash | 10¹² | GPUs on Pearl, Bitcoin ASICs |
| PH/s | petahash | 10¹⁵ | pools and large farms |
| EH/s | exahash | 10¹⁸ | the whole Bitcoin network |
For example, the 316 TH/s of an RTX 4090 means 316 trillion hashes per second, while the 22 KH/s of a Ryzen 9 7950X means 22 thousand. The hashrate of the whole Bitcoin network in 2026 is measured in hundreds and thousands of EH/s.
Why hashrate can’t be compared between coins
Not all hashes are equal. Each coin uses its own algorithm, and a single attempt takes a completely different amount of work in different algorithms. Monero’s RandomX was deliberately made “heavy”: it runs random programs and uses memory heavily, so a processor manages only thousands of hashes per second. The Pearl algorithm is light for a graphics card, hence the trillions.
So the right question is not “who has the higher hashrate” but “who earns more”. An RTX 4090 at 316 TH/s brings in $232.55 a month, and a Ryzen 9 7950X at 22 KH/s brings in $26.95: the difference in “speed” is billions of times, but in money it is roughly tenfold.
How hashrate turns into money
Within one algorithm everything is linear: twice the hashrate means twice the income. Your share of the rewards equals your hashrate divided by the hashrate of the whole network. Here is how it looks for graphics cards at the rate of October 28, 2026 (the figures are recalculated at the current rate):
| Graphics card | Hashrate | Income / day | Income / mo |
|---|---|---|---|
| RTX 3060 12 GB | 50 TH/s | $1.23 | $36.80 |
| RTX 4060 | 62 TH/s | $1.52 | $45.63 |
| RTX 4070 SUPER | 140 TH/s | $3.43 | $103.03 |
| RTX 5080 | 228 TH/s | $5.59 | $167.79 |
| RTX 4090 | 316 TH/s | $7.75 | $232.55 |
| RTX 5090 | 402 TH/s | $9.86 | $295.83 |
See other models’ income in the mining calculator.
Network hashrate and difficulty
When new miners join the network, its total hashrate grows, and to keep blocks coming at the same pace the network automatically raises the difficulty. Your hashrate stays the same, but your share of the rewards — and the income per TH/s — shrinks. And vice versa: when miners leave, everyone who stays earns more.
Together with the coin price, difficulty is the main reason the income from the same graphics card changes from month to month. That is why the FlowHash calculator and guides use fresh data rather than numbers written down once. How this affects profitability is covered in “Is mining profitable in 2026?”.
How to check your hashrate
- In the app. FlowHash shows the current speed of each device — graphics card and processor — while it mines.
- In the calculator. Before you even start, you can look up an estimate for your model in the calculator. Real speed usually differs by 10–20%: cooling, drivers, memory and settings all play a part.
- By earnings. The full picture is easiest to see in your account — in the daily and weekly accruals.
Don’t worry if the number jumps around: the pool sees your work in portions (“shares”) that are found at random. Look at the average over several hours, not the instant value.
How to increase your hashrate
- Update your graphics driver: new versions sometimes speed up calculations noticeably.
- Watch the temperature. An overheated graphics card or processor lowers its clocks, and the hashrate drops on its own. A clean case and good airflow are the cheapest “overclock”.
- Tune the graphics card. Overclocking and Power Limit in MSI Afterburner are covered in detail in “GPU overclocking”.
- For a processor, two RAM sticks in dual-channel mode, an XMP/EXPO profile in the BIOS and a large L3 cache matter — more in “CPU mining”.
- Don’t run heavy tasks at the same time: a game or a render takes resources, and the hashrate drops temporarily.
- Keep a laptop plugged in and in maximum performance mode: on battery it runs several times slower.
Hashrate per watt: what matters more
A high hashrate does not automatically mean high profit: electricity has to be subtracted from income. That is why miners look at efficiency — how much hashrate a card delivers per watt. The higher it is, the more expensive the electricity at which the card stays profitable:
| Graphics card | Hashrate | Power | TH/s per watt | Breaks even up to, $/kWh |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RTX 4080 | 220 TH/s | 255 W | 0.86 | $0.88 |
| RTX 5090 | 402 TH/s | 573 W | 0.70 | $0.72 |
| RTX 4070 SUPER | 140 TH/s | 200 W | 0.70 | $0.72 |
| RTX 5070 Ti | 178 TH/s | 300 W | 0.59 | $0.61 |
| RTX 4060 | 62 TH/s | 115 W | 0.54 | $0.55 |
| RTX 3080 10 GB | 107 TH/s | 304 W | 0.35 | $0.36 |
| RTX 3060 12 GB | 50 TH/s | 170 W | 0.29 | $0.30 |
Modern RTX 40 and RTX 50 cards deliver 1.5–3 times more hashrate per watt than RTX 30, which is why they pay off better with expensive electricity. The full ranking is in “Best GPUs for mining”.
Bottom line
Hashrate is the number of attempts per second, and within one algorithm income grows in proportion to it. The units differ by factors of a thousand (H/s, KH/s, MH/s, GH/s, TH/s), and devices mining different coins are better compared by income in dollars. For profit, what matters is not just hashrate but also efficiency per watt, the coin price and network difficulty.
How much will your PC earn?
Pick your GPU and CPU in the calculator — it estimates income and profit at your electricity rate.