Home Mining Economics at Aussie Power Prices: The 2026 Breakeven
Does a Bitaxe Gamma pay for itself in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, or on off-peak Tasmanian hydro? We run the numbers at real AEMO retail tariffs — and at the solar export rate your neighbour gets paid.
There’s a persistent myth that home bitcoin mining in Australia is “dead.” It isn’t. What’s dead is running an Antminer S19 in your spare room on peak retail tariffs. The new generation of low-power hobby miners — Bitaxe Gamma, NerdQaxe++, Avalon Nano — use between 15 W and 200 W and are designed to live on a desk, under a solar array, or on a controlled-load tariff.
The question isn’t “is mining profitable?” It’s “at what kWh price does my miner turn a profit, given my network difficulty, pool choice, and variance tolerance?” This article runs the 2026 numbers using real Australian tariffs.
The one equation that matters
Mining profitability reduces to one line of maths:
Daily profit (AUD) = (daily BTC mined × AUD/BTC) − (miner power in kW × 24 × AUD/kWh)
Everything else is noise. Let’s plug in conservative 2026 assumptions and see what falls out.
Fixed inputs (network-wide, as of this post):
- Network hashrate: ~800 EH/s
- BTC/AUD price: AU$100,000 (adjust to taste; the sensitivity analysis below lets you substitute)
- Block reward: 3.125 BTC (post-halving)
Per-miner inputs:
| Miner | Hashrate | Power draw | Efficiency |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bitaxe Gamma 1.2 TH/s | 1.2 TH/s | 17 W | 14 J/TH |
| Bitaxe Ultra 500 GH/s | 0.5 TH/s | 12 W | 24 J/TH |
| NerdQaxe++ 4.8 TH/s | 4.8 TH/s | 75 W | 16 J/TH |
| Avalon Nano 3S | 3 TH/s | 150 W | 50 J/TH |
Daily BTC expected (pooled)
For pooled mining (FPPS), daily BTC expectation scales linearly with your share of the network:
Daily BTC = (your hashrate / network hashrate) × 144 blocks × 3.125 BTC
Running the numbers for a Bitaxe Gamma at 1.2 TH/s against 800 EH/s of competition:
1.2 TH/s ÷ 800,000,000 TH/s × 144 × 3.125 BTC ≈ 0.00000067 BTC/day
At AU$100k/BTC that’s ~AU$0.067/day of gross revenue. Scale up from there.
| Miner | Hashrate | Daily gross (AUD @ $100k BTC) |
|---|---|---|
| Bitaxe Ultra | 0.5 TH/s | $0.028 |
| Bitaxe Gamma | 1.2 TH/s | $0.067 |
| NerdQaxe++ | 4.8 TH/s | $0.270 |
| Avalon Nano 3S | 3.0 TH/s | $0.169 |
Those numbers look brutal — and they are if you pay AU$0.35/kWh. The revenue side is fixed by the network; the only variable you control is the denominator.
Power costs: what Aussies actually pay
Retail electricity in Australia varies wildly. Here are the realistic bands for 2026 based on AEMO default market offers and the big three retailers (AGL, Origin, EnergyAustralia):
| Tariff type | Typical AUD/kWh | Where it applies |
|---|---|---|
| Peak retail (anytime) | $0.28 – $0.40 | Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne flat-rate plans |
| Shoulder / off-peak (ToU) | $0.18 – $0.25 | Most ToU plans 10pm–7am |
| Controlled load | $0.15 – $0.22 | Hot-water / dedicated circuit tariffs |
| Tasmania standing | $0.28 – $0.32 | Tas hydro retail |
| Off-peak controlled (TAS) | $0.14 – $0.18 | Dedicated controlled-load circuits in Tas |
| Solar self-consumption | ~$0.00 – $0.05 | Panels on your roof, export tariff < usage cost |
| Solar export feed-in (current) | $0.04 – $0.08 | The rate retailers pay you — opportunity cost of not mining with it |
The last row is the killer insight: if you have rooftop solar in 2026, your export tariff is under 8 c/kWh. Running a 17 W Bitaxe on that sunlight during the day costs you ~$0.035/day in forgone export revenue and earns ~$0.067/day in mined sats. That’s a 2× multiplier on solar value.
Breakeven table for each Bitaxe scenario
The question becomes: what AUD/kWh makes each miner break even? Solve for kWh_price = daily_gross / (power_kW × 24).
| Miner | Daily revenue | Power × 24 (kWh) | Break-even kWh price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bitaxe Ultra | $0.028 | 0.288 kWh | $0.097/kWh |
| Bitaxe Gamma | $0.067 | 0.408 kWh | $0.164/kWh |
| NerdQaxe++ | $0.270 | 1.800 kWh | $0.150/kWh |
| Avalon Nano 3S | $0.169 | 3.600 kWh | $0.047/kWh |
Reading across:
- A Bitaxe Gamma is profitable at any kWh price below ~16.4 c. That means off-peak, controlled-load, Tas off-peak, or any solar scenario.
- A Bitaxe Ultra needs ~10 c/kWh — effectively solar or Tas controlled-load only.
- The NerdQaxe++ punches above its weight at 15 J/TH — profitable on any off-peak plan across the mainland.
- The Avalon Nano 3S is brutal at 50 J/TH. Only profitable on solar or the very cheapest controlled-load. Don’t run this one on flat-rate retail.
The pool-choice multiplier
The pooled-FPPS numbers above assume you receive your fair share of every block the pool finds. Solo mining (e.g. Parasite Pool or ausolo.ckpool.org) has the same expected value — it’s the variance that’s different.
- Probability of a Bitaxe Gamma solo-mining a block in any given year ≈ (1.2 TH/s / 800 EH/s) × 52,560 blocks ≈ 0.008%
- Expected value per year ≈ 0.00008 × 3.125 BTC ≈ 0.000246 BTC ≈ AU$24.60/yr at $100k BTC.
For pooled at the same hashrate: AU$0.067/day × 365 = AU$24.45/yr. Functionally identical within rounding.
So solo mining doesn’t give you less money in expectation — it gives you the same money in a completely different distribution. Pooled drips AU$24/year across 365 tiny payouts. Solo mining gives you a 0.008% chance of hitting the full AU$312,500 block reward. It’s a lottery ticket where you also own the printing press.
One tail risk pooled miners ignore: orphan blocks. If two miners find a block within seconds of each other, only one makes it into the chain — the other is orphaned and pays nothing. Historically this hits ~0.1% of all blocks. For a pooled miner it’s invisible (the pool absorbs the loss). For a solo miner it means zero payout on a block you genuinely solved.
Worked example: Sydney bitcoiner with rooftop solar
Say you live in Northern Beaches, run a 6.6 kW rooftop array, and typically export 20 kWh/day of excess back to the grid at the 5 c/kWh feed-in tariff.
Opportunity cost of exporting: 20 kWh × $0.05 = AU$1/day
Divert a Bitaxe Gamma + NerdQaxe++ from that export (~2 kWh/day combined):
- Forgone export revenue: 2 kWh × $0.05 = AU$0.10/day
- Mining revenue: $0.067 + $0.270 = AU$0.337/day
- Net gain: AU$0.237/day, or ~AU$86/year per kilowatt-hour of diverted solar.
Across a 200 W combined mining setup on solar, that’s a ~3× return on every diverted kWh versus selling it back to the grid. And it stacks sats.
The TL;DR
- Peak retail mainland tariffs (>$0.28/kWh): only the Bitaxe Gamma is marginally break-even. Skip anything less efficient.
- Off-peak / controlled-load (<$0.20/kWh): Gamma and NerdQaxe++ are in the green. Ultra is marginal.
- Solar excess (<$0.08/kWh): everything’s profitable, including the older Avalon Nano if the capex is right.
- Tasmania hydro off-peak: you win by default. Just buy more Bitaxes.
- Pooled vs solo: identical expected value, very different distribution. Pooled = daily drip. Solo = 0.008% chance of a AU$312,500 jackpot. Pick your variance tolerance.
The broader point: solo-mining economics in 2026 Australia is entirely a kWh-price story. Pick the right tariff (or better, the right paddock of solar) and it works. Pick the wrong one and you’re space-heating your office for the price of a gym membership.
Numbers current as of 20 April 2026. Bitcoin price, network hashrate and retail tariffs all move — the spreadsheet lives or dies on whichever number is staler. We’ll republish this piece every quarter; subscribe via the RSS feed to catch the updates.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is home bitcoin mining profitable in Australia in 2026?
On peak retail tariffs (~AU$0.35/kWh in NSW/VIC/QLD) a stock Bitaxe Gamma runs at roughly break-even or a small net loss. On solar feed-in or a controlled-load tariff (AU$0.08–AU$0.12/kWh) you're clearly in the green. Solo-mining variance means the pool vs solo choice matters more than the hardware cost.
What's the single biggest lever for profitability?
Electricity cost per kWh. Hashrate and efficiency are secondary. Moving from a peak retail rate to daytime solar or off-peak flips most Bitaxes from marginal to profitable overnight.
Should I run a Bitaxe on solar only?
If you already have PV with export tariffs under AU$0.06/kWh, diverting that excess to mining instead of exporting is almost always better economics. Many Aussie bitcoiners run a Bitaxe plus a small inverter/load-balancer on their solar panels during sunlight hours.