3 Mining Pools Captured Nearly 30% of Bitcoin Blocks Since Launch

Onchain data from Cloverpool, the mining pool formerly known as btc.com, shows that an entity labeled “unknown” holds the all-time lead in Bitcoin block production with 230,770 blocks, or 24.03% of all blocks mined. This category includes solo miners, small operations that did not tag their blocks, and early miners such as Satoshi Nakamoto.

Among named pools, Antpool ranks second with 109,004 blocks (11.35%), followed by F2pool with 98,148 blocks (10.22%). Together with Foundry USA (72,569 blocks, 7.56%), these three pools account for 29.13% of all blocks mined since Bitcoin’s inception.

Foundry USA, a subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, launched in late 2020 and has since grown to dominate current network hashrate, benefiting from the 2021 Chinese mining crackdown that shifted operations to North America. Despite its high current hashrate, its historical block count is lower due to its later start.

Other notable pools include ViaBTC (52,116 blocks, 5.43%), Braiins Pool (formerly Slushpool, 41,969 blocks, 4.37%), and defunct pools BTC Guild (32,935 blocks, 3.43%) and Ghash.IO (23,083 blocks, 2.40%). Poolin, once the largest pool, has mined 28,039 blocks (2.92%) and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July 2026.

The concentration of blocks in the unknown category underscores Bitcoin’s partially documented early history. Meanwhile, the top four live hashrate pools—Foundry, Antpool, F2pool, and ViaBTC—produce a Nakamoto coefficient near three, highlighting ongoing centralization concerns in pooled mining.

Source: https://news.bitcoin.com/mining/3-mining-pools-captured-nearly-30-of-bitcoin-blocks-since-launch/