Why we don’t yet know the precise date or time of the bitcoin halving

This global event will take place next week. It does not depend on a precise calendar, but on the number of blocks validated on the blockchain.

Much has been said that the bitcoin halving will occur around April 19-20, but at this stage we do not yet know the precise moment. Indeed, depending on the cryptocurrency platforms, the dates, especially the times, differ slightly.

The Bitpanda platform sees it coming on April 20 in the early hours of Paris, while Binance is counting on an early evening French time. In fact, it’s not about the calendar, but rather about mining and blocks on the blockchain.

Indeed and as a reminder, this event takes place approximately every four years and more precisely every 210,000 blocks validated on the Bitcoin blockchain. A passage which will therefore take place next week at a precise moment. This is a halving of the number of bitcoins issued to the market as a reward to miners (who validate transactions on the blockchain). From an economic point of view, this consists of a halving of the issuance of new bitcoins.

In his white paper, Satoshi Nakamoto set a limited number of bitcoins in circulation on the market of 21 million, in order to make bitcoin rare. Since the creation of bitcoin in 2009, 3 halvings have already taken place: in 2012, in 2016 and in 2020. After 3 different halvings, 19.68 million bitcoins have already been put into circulation. It is estimated that 21 million bitcoins will have been mined around 2140.

10 minutes

Upon validation of a block which takes place approximately every 10 minutes, new bitcoins are given as a reward to miners. Over the last 3 halvings, the number of bitcoins distributed to each miner has been halved, from 50 to 25 bitcoins in 2012, then from 25 to 12.5 bitcoins in 2016 and finally from 12.5 to 6.25 bitcoins in 2020.

In April 2024, the number of bitcoins distributed to each miner will increase from 6.25 to 3.125 bitcoins. In total, the number of bitcoins issued will increase from 900 bitcoins to 450 bitcoins each day after the 2024 halving.