Public Miners' Hashrate Plummets as AI Revenue Accelerates
The public bitcoin miners that have been shifting their focus towards AI and high-performance computing infrastructure are continuing to reduce their bitcoin hashrate. According to data from TheEnergyMag, these miners produced a combined realized hashrate of 368.3 EH/s in Q4 2025, but this number declined to 319.0 EH/s in Q2 2026.
This represents a 13.4% decline in six months, with the Bitcoin network's quarterly average falling by 10.6%. The public company cohort contracted faster than the network, with the main culprit being Core Scientific and TeraWulf, which have seen colocation revenue rise sharply while their bitcoin mining revenue has decreased.
Core Scientific generated $136.7 million in colocation revenue in Q2, almost five times its $27.5 million of bitcoin mining revenue. Colocation supplied 83% of quarterly sales for the company, up from 67% in Q1. TeraWulf also saw a significant increase in HPC lease revenue, which reached $31.9 million or 71% of total revenue.
The industry's shift towards AI and high-performance computing is driven by weak mining economics and competing uses for capital and electricity. The post-China arms race unwinds as public miners dismantle their capacity to focus on more lucrative opportunities.