What happens to bitcoin when all coins are mined?

When all coins are mined, the bitcoin network keeps running, but no new coins are created. Miners, the computers that add new blocks of transactions, will stop receiving freshly issued bitcoin and will be paid only through the transaction fees that users attach to their payments. The last bitcoin is expected to be mined around the year 2140.

When will all bitcoin be mined?

Bitcoin's supply is capped at 21 million coins, a limit set in its code. Our guide on why there are only 21 million bitcoin covers where that number comes from.

New coins enter circulation through the block subsidy, the fixed number of new bitcoin awarded to the miner of each block. The subsidy started at 50 bitcoin and is cut in half roughly every four years, or every 210,000 blocks, an event known as the bitcoin halving. The fourth halving, in April 2024, cut it to 3.125 bitcoin. The next is expected around 2028, when it should fall to 1.5625 bitcoin.

Because the subsidy keeps halving, it shrinks toward the smallest unit of bitcoin, a satoshi, or 0.00000001 bitcoin. That point is projected for around 2140, after which the subsidy reaches zero. The final total will sit slightly below 21 million.

How will miners be paid when the last bitcoin is mined in 2140?

Miners already earn two kinds of income: the block subsidy and the fees on the transactions they include. A fee is the difference between what a transaction spends and what it sends on. Users bid for limited block space, and miners tend to pick transactions that pay more.

The fee model was part of the original plan. The 2008 Bitcoin white paper by Satoshi Nakamoto says that once a set number of coins has entered circulation, the reward can move entirely to transaction fees and be "completely inflation free."

Are miner transaction fees enough to secure bitcoin?

This is the main open question. For now, fees are a small slice of miner income. The Block reported in November 2025 that fees made up less than 1% of miner revenue, at a 12-month low, while the subsidy still supplied most of it.

Mining is what protects bitcoin. The more computing power miners devote to the network, the harder and more expensive it is to attack. Critics, as summarized by CoinGecko, warn that if fees alone do not pay enough, some miners could switch off, lowering that protection and raising the risk of a 51% attack. Supporters argue that fees should rise as demand for block space grows. Bitcoin also has a built-in difficulty adjustment that makes mining easier if computing power drops, which helps blocks keep coming.

Nobody can know how this will play out more than a century from now.

Crypto prices are volatile, and nothing about bitcoin's supply schedule guarantees its future value.