With demand for Bitcoin on the rise in response to soaring prices of late, attention is increasingly being turned to mining.

However, the market has changed from the early days of cryptocurrency, when Bitcoin was in plentiful supply, as few knew about the opportunity and high mining rewards could be gained by individuals using a small setup at home.

These days, an unhelpful combination of fierce competition, algorithmic difficulties and high maintenance costs often mean it’s economically unviable to fly solo when mining crypto. In response, a novel alternative has emerged for those who are reluctant to purchase expensive equipment and pay astronomical electricity bills: cloud mining powered by remote data centers.

“Affordable and fuss-free”

Hashing24 says its remote Bitcoin mining services give consumers a chance to lease hashing power from industry-leading data centers that have already done the heavy lifting by investing in their own hi-tech equipment for mining cryptocurrencies — predominantly Bitcoin.

According to the company, this approach can help solve the dilemma that many individual miners are facing at home. PCs and graphics processing units are not enough to cut through the noise in this increasingly advanced industry — and any revenue generated through mining is often outweighed by the cost of the energy it took to get there.

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This isn’t the only hurdle on the horizon, as it can often prove near impossible for a single computer to compete with expansive mining pools, in which groups of miners combine their computing hash rates and distribute any proceeds between themselves. Although this could seem like a tempting proposition, Hashing24 claims this approach also has its downsides, as there are times when participants are not rewarded equally for their efforts.

As an alternative, remote mining services can enable individuals to enter into agreements with data centers that know what they are doing. Pricing is delivered in the form of a contract — and from here, the mining process is somewhat comparable to ordering a new pair of shoes from Amazon. Hashing24 sends the mining order to huge processing centers based across Europe, which use equipment with a 100% uptime, and minted coins are delivered on a daily basis.

Is it practical?

According to Hashing24, remote mining is not something that is to be embarked on lightly — and there are a multitude of factors that individuals need to take into account. A provider’s reputation, length of service and the technology they rely upon can all prove crucial in ensuring that consumers aren’t left out of pocket. It’s also important for those who lease mining capacity to do the math and devise detailed financial plans that weigh up revenue against cost. The length of a mining contract, when coupled with the constant issue of volatility in cryptocurrency prices, can place a significant strain on budgets and affect the end result. Maintenance fees also need to be considered — and depending on the provider, this charge could be weaved into a contract’s price or deducted when coins are minted.

Hashing24 says one way of weighing up the costs and benefits can be through using a mining calculator, which takes a multitude of factors into account to provide a projection of potential returns in the future. Demo mining can also be used to see how strategies would work in a simulated environment.

Hashing24’s partner — Bitfury — has data centers based in Canada, Norway, Iceland and Georgia. The company says that it uses the newest Application-Specific Integrated Circuits — otherwise known as ASICs, for short. This is coupled with the latest air and immersion cooling technology to guarantee performance while mitigating costs.

Learn more about Hashing24