Among all the many names in the cryptocurrency world right now, Litecoin is one of the currencies with the highest market capitalization, usually within the twenty most valuable and traded.
In this article, then, you will learn about it and how to properly mine it.
Can You Mine Litecoin With GPU?
Unfortunately, you can’t. Litecoin is mined exclusively with the use of ASIC, just like Bitcoin. This makes the network very competitive and drives the coin’s price to crazy levels.
If you are still looking for a coin to mine, consider Mining XMR With GPU.
In case you are just starting to learn about crypto mining, we can explain the matter briefly to you.
Most coins require powerful GPUs to be mined, the same type of device you would get to play AAA games at the highest quality.
However, some networks started being exploited by miners using another type of equipment: ASIC. This changed the whole game.
ASIC (Application-specific integrated circuit) is a device created for a specific purpose. When most people hear the term ASIC, their first reaction is to assume it’s a digital circuit.
In reality, any custom chip is an ASIC, regardless of whether it is analog, digital, or a mix of the two.
But to simplify the discussion let’s assume that a chip is fully or predominantly digital.
Any analog or mixed-function belongs to physical interfaces PHYs (Physical Interfaces) or PLLs (phase-locked loops).
ASICs are typically designed and used for a specific system. They are very expensive, require a lot of development time and a lot of resources.
On the other hand, they offer a very high performance allied to low energy consumption.
ASICs are very superior to GPUs in mining, just as GPUs are superior to CPUs in the same task.
However, some networks are ASIC-resistant, which makes miners still buy lots of GPUs to assemble their mining rigs.
If you are an Apple user, check Mining Pools For Mac Users.
Is it profitable to mine Litecoin with GPU?
As already explained, mining Litecoin requires an ASIC (or more than one, if you can afford it and you truly want to make a profit on the network). However, there are other options for people that only have a GPU and want to get access to Litecoin without having to buy it.
Some services let you mine a certain coin and get your rewards in a totally different currency.
This is especially useful in cases where you want to get paid in coins that use a Proof-of-Stake protocol.
A similar option is having your funds converted immediately after you get rewarded for mining.
NiceHash has been reportedly useful to mine other common altcoins and trade them for Litecoin.
All you have to do is download its software, follow the instructions (it is really simple), and click the play button.
Now you should be able to mine any coin and get Litecoins to your wallet.
Check Best Mining Pools For New Zealand.
How To Mine Litecoin?
If you are genuinely interested in mining Litecoin, by now you already know that you will need to buy an ASIC.
There are plenty of options out there, some are more powerful than others. The best ASIC miner for Litecoin miners is the Antminer L3+ manufactured by Bitmain. You can read all about it here.
In case you first want to know how much you would make by mining Litecoin at your home, you need to figure out how much you pay for electricity and then go here.
Depending on your whole setup, you might find out that you will lose money in the long run.
Joining a pool or getting more than one ASIC can solve the problem and start making you some solid profit.
After you get your ASIC to mine coins, you need to create a wallet at some service that can store Litecoin.
Binance and Coinbase are great options as they are huge names of the crypto industry, and thus are very trustworthy.
If you are Canadian, we have already published an article about great DCEs in Canada, some of them which have a wallet service too.
Now comes the great question: mining solo or join a pool?
Mining alone is a huge risk if you only count with one ASIC, as you can spend a long time without mining a single block.
If you join forces in a pool of miners, however, you will have a steadier income. This already seems to answer the question, right?
If you are going to mine in a pool, you can join the Litecoinpool. As the name suggests, it is a pool entirely dedicated to Litecoin. It is stable and reliable, so it is a great place to start.
In case you feel like exploring more pools, we have some recommendations as well.
Prohashing, viaBTC, Antpool, Poolin are also amazing mining pools for Litecoin miners. If you want to check the status of each of them, just click here.
Now, as for the proper setting up, just follow the steps below and you should be fine.
- If you got the Antminer ASIC, go to BitMain and create an account
- On the main hardware controller, press the IP Reporter button for 5 seconds (until you hear it beep).
- When you see the IP address on the screen, enter it into the BitMain site
- Now enter your wallet address
- If you are pool mining, go to Miner Configurations and then General Settings
- Enter the URL of the mining pool, your worker ID, and your password
Alternative coins to mine with GPU
Perhaps you read all the way here and decided that getting an ASIC just to mine crypto is too much trouble.
That is comprehensible, as this is quite an investment not everyone is ready to commit.
However, you do not need to get an ASIC to enter the mining game. Plenty of profitable coins can still be mined with GPU, so let’s cover a few of them.
Monero
Monero is currently being listed in most, if not all, “top coins to mine” independently of the specifics such as “mine with GPU”, “mine with GPU”, etc.
It simply is highly profitable and so easy to start mining. Even though you can mine it with a CPU, not much profit comes from it (you should make around $4/mo with a regular Intel Core i5, for example).
When GPUs enter the game, however, all the scenario changes. With greater processing power, comes greater profit as well.
With a common GPU, you should already make a few dollars monthly, electricity costs already deducted.
If you want to step up and get a high-grading GPU or a set of them, then you are up to start having some passive income.
Remember that this also opens the door to trading for other coins in case you are knowledgeable in speculation.
- Reward: 2.15 XMR/block
- Hashing function: CryptoNightR
- Block time: 2 minutes (average)
Zcash
Even though Zcash is among the volatile coins (as almost any cryptocurrency issued so far), its price isn’t so fluctuant, making it attractive for new miners and investors alike.
Not only that, but its security protocol is also a great step towards full anonymity in financial trades.
As for miners, what matters is how easy it is to mine Zcash. Well, it can give you profit whether you mine it with a GPU, a CPU or both. Of course, mining with a GPU is always better, so you should choose that if you can.
- Reward: 10 ZEC
- Hashing Function: Equihash
- Block time: 75 seconds (post-Blossom upgrade)
Grin
Grin is a pretty recent coin as it was released in 2019. Its take on privacy uses the Cuckoo algorithm, in a version that makes the blockchain ASIC-resistant, and also the whole application lightweight, becoming a matter of interest for new miners.
It is easy to start mining Grin from home with a simple setup including a GPU.
- Hashing Function: CuckARood-29, CuckAToo-31, Cuckaroom-29
- Mining Reward: 60 GRIN per block
- Block time: One minute (average)
How many Litecoins are left?
More than 66,000,000 LTC are already in circulation, in wallets and exchanges, being stored or used in daily transactions.
With that in mind, we can assume that there are around 17,000,000 LTC left for miners to extract from the blockchain. Once all of that is mined, the supply cap gets reached.
One might think that this should happen soon. However, every 840,000 blocks mined, the rewards are halved, so the mining gets slower.
According to Litecoin Foundation, all LTC should be mined until 2142. If you are a miner today, you don’t have to worry about that.
Final Thoughts
Litecoin isn’t as accessible as other cryptocurrencies you can mine right now.
However, it is profitable, so it is understandable if you choose to buy one or more Antminer and start your own investment.
Another option is also to start mining lesser demanding coins like Monero, Zcash and so many others (really, there is an ocean of coins out there).
This way you make a safer investment and see how it goes with your electricity consumption.
