What Is the Best Cryptocurrency to Mine? Top Crypto 2022

Mining is a popular way to make money with crypto without investing huge amounts of money, and the risk is much lower as the hardware can be reused on other cryptos if your selected crypto disappears.

One of the big problems these days is that much of the easy or profitable crypto has been mined, and over the years, mining has become less profitable, but people still make money doing it and continue to do so.

Mining is an essential component of the operation of cryptos, and there is a massive fanbase of tech enthusiasts and entrepreneurs involved in the process. Mining is something that most people are interested in trying, simply to see how it works, without the intention of making vast amounts of money.

The big thing to understand is that crypto mining can still be profitable, easy, and is attainable by most people willing to spend a little money and time to get things set up correctly for the new way of mining crypto.

Detailed in this article is all you will need to understand about crypto mining and which cryptocurrencies are the best to turn your mining rigs towards.

• – What Is the Best Cryptocurrency to Mine? Top Crypto 2022
• – What Is Crypto Mining?
• – How Can You Mine Crypto?
• – ASIC Mining
• – GPU Mining
• – CPU Mining
• – Cryptocurrency Mining Methods
• – Solo Mining Method
• – Pool Mining Method
• – Cloud Mining Method
• – Which Cryptocurrencies Are The Best To Mine?
• – Highest Profitability Cryptos To Mine
• – Ethereum (ETH)
• – Ethereum Classic (ETC)
• – Monacoin (MONA)
• – Vertcoin (VTC)
• – ZCash (ZEC)
• – Grin (GRIN)
• – Monero (XMR)
• – RavenCoin (RVN)
• – Dash (DASH)
• – DigiByte (DGB)
• – Litecoin (LTC)
• – Easiest Cryptos To Mine
• – Aeon (AEON)
• – SweatCoin
• – Dogecoin (DOGE)
• – Bitcoin Gold (BTG)
• – Final Thoughts On Crypto Mining
• – Crypto Mining Frequently Asked Questions
• – Why Is Mining Bitcoin A Bad Idea?
• – Is It Still Profitable To Mine Crypto?
• – What’s the Best Crypto To Mine In 2022?
• – What Is The Easiest Crypto To Mine?
• – Is Ethereum Mining Still Worth It In 2022?

What Is Crypto Mining?

Cryptocurrency mining is the process that Bitcoin and many other cryptocurrencies use to produce new coins or tokens. The mining process verifies and secures blockchains, which is the virtual ledger for each cryptocurrency.

As a crypto-miner, your computer hardware and software would be used to solve complex mathematical equations as part of the process to validate crypto transactions. Your reward for doing so can build towards coins or parts of coins.

Because there isn’t a single blockchain or cryptocurrency, the process can differ depending on which one you’re talking about and what that crypto has set up.

Proof-Of-Work (POW) based algorithms require high-end hardware, and your electricity costs will be much higher when mining this type of crypto.

Proof-Of-Stake (POS) based algorithms require you to put a stake into the cryptocurrency, so you need to own a large chunk before becoming a miner. The more of the crypto you own, the more you can make from mining.

How Can You Mine Crypto?

You have three main options when mining crypto, which can be divided into the three types of hardware used, which includes:

ASIC Mining

ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit) mining is the least well-known method, but it is the most efficient crypto mining hardware available. Unlike CPUs or GPUs that have other tasks they can perform, an ASIC is dedicated to one job, ASIC miners for crypto mining. Its entire purpose is to solve complex mathematical problems that are used in the validation and securing of a blockchain.

ASIC miners are generally designed for specific cryptos, so they can’t really be reused for another crypto if the primary were to disappear. So these miners are better for the larger cryptos that will be sticking around for some time.

An ASIC miner will cost you $300 - $500, and it’s about 100,000 times more efficient than a CPU or GPU-based crypto miner.

The problem with ASIC miners is that you’re mostly stuck with one crypto, and the list of cryptos available is much shorter than that for CPU or GPU miners.

You can’t upgrade ASICs, and they’re not especially durable, so you need to ensure that your ROI stays high enough before buying new ones for the crypto you’re mining.

GPU Mining

GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) is primarily used for enhanced graphics on movies but really enhances the processing and play in computer games. It has been adapted into a crypto miner as well, though, due to its high processing power.

Is GPU Mining Still Profitable? GPU mining isn’t as efficient as ASIC mining, but your options are wide open for which cryptocurrencies you want to mine, which is helpful if you’re trying to break into some of the newer crypto markets.

Many CPU minings are run when the owners are not playing games, so it can perform double duty, and many people simply use them to make back the cost of the GPU and any power consumed that month.

The difference between them and a real crypto miner would be the underlying computer system and components used. So to GPU mine for profit, you will need to buy a high-end GPU with a high-end computer attached to it.

You’ll also need to ensure with the GPU, computer system, and standard wallet-hardware combo, you’ll need to find mining software that is compatible with your new rig.

For example you can see below list of most profitable coins to mine with GPU (GeForce RTX 3090):

CPU Mining

CPU mining is the oldest and potentially least effective method for mining crypto. Special software will be installed and use your CPU power to crunch the blockchain numbers.

Using CPU mining is considered slow and inefficient; it’s also got the potential to harm your CPU. Is there any most profitable coins to mine with cpu? The profits made through mining may not be worth it if your CPU burns out and you need to replace it or your entire system.

You can also use your mobile device for CPU mining; however, this also has the downside of overloading, overheating, and generally damaging your mobile device.

CPU mining is generally not considered to be a business move but just a way for general people to experience and play with bitcoin mining software and see a little profit jump out for their fun.

Best CPU Mining Coin? If you do plan to CPU mine, the advice would be to stick with smaller cryptocurrencies that don’t require high processing power to work with; otherwise, you may be moving towards an overloaded and damaged CPU that needs replacing.

Cryptocurrency Mining Methods

Outside of the hardware you use for crypt mining, it can be broken down into three different methodologies that people use to mine coins.

Solo Mining Method

Solo mining is simply the process of mining by yourself without any support from outside parties or mining equipment owned by other miners working together. You are in control of the equipment, and all profits are yours.

Solo miners can range from brand new miners with a CPU-based mining operation all the way up to complex mining farms with a huge array of servers and devices mining 24x7. It’s really just about how much money you can put in and how much you want to keep for yourself.

As a solo miner, your profits can range heavily depending on the equipment you can afford for your own crypto mining operation.

Pool Mining Method

Pool mining is the method of joining resources to mine a single block on a crypto blockchain; you join the processing power of your rig with others to work towards a single computation. The overall costs and power consumption are lower, but the rewards are also lower.

What’s important to understand is that while the rewards for a single block may be lower for you, the processing power of pooled mining operations can cut through blocks much faster, so you could be earning more by processing more blocks faster than if you stick with your own rig in solo mining.

You can create your own pool mining groups with friends, or you can join groups of people online, but you’ll need to do some research to ensure that you’re not mining for nothing.

Cloud Mining Method

Cloud mining is similar to any kind of cloud service; you’re renting space and resources on cloud computers to mine crypto coins. You may be paying a monthly cost, or you could be splitting the profits with the owner depending on how things have been set up.

If you own a mining rig or have resources available, you can rent out your server for somebody to use to mine crypto coins. This may or may not be worthwhile to you, but if you have a space machine around and don’t want to do the mining yourself, it can pull in a little money for you.

Often the cloud mining servers you use are from mining farms with extra resources, and you’re just jumping on board to do the legwork to find the best cryptos to mine.

Unless you can find very favorable rentals for mining rigs, this may not be an ideal solution for you vs. solo mining.

Which Cryptocurrencies Are The Best To Mine?

Most people just getting into crypto mining will jump to Bitcoin as what they want to mine because it has the biggest profits. Unfortunately, it’s time and resource-consuming to mine big cryptos like bitcoin.

Reviewed below are some of the better cryptocurrencies to mine so that you can make a profit. After all, it’s not about what crypto you mine; it’s about finding ways to make the most profit from your mining operation.

Highest Profitability Cryptos To Mine

Profitability should be the main thing you’re looking for when mining cryptocurrencies; it doesn’t matter what the crypto is called. You need to determine how much you can make based on the cost of the coin along with your costs to mine that coin.

To calculate how much your costs are, which can include the initial purchase of the rig divided by how long it’s expected to last. You need to determine how much your electricity will be for running the mining rig 24x7. You then need to determine or test how long it takes your rig to run through the calculations.

Once you understand your costs, you need to look at how much the coin is worth to see whether it’s profitable to use that cryptocurrency in your mining operation. You should be looking to make a reasonable profit and not $2 off each coin, or worse still, you shouldn’t be losing money.

There are a number of mining calculators that will take in the coin you want to mine, your hardware, your expected hashing power, along with other metrics to produce how much you can expect to pay for each coin. You’ll want to validate the results after each coin to confirm you’re profitable in the mining operation.

You can also check out whattomine.com, which provides some good information on cryptocurrencies with high profitability. Keep in mind, cryptocurrency mining is a long term investment. It’s important, though, to keep track of crypto prices as they fluctuate and also keep track of your real profits to make sure things are running as expected.

Ethereum (ETH)

• Block Time: 13 seconds
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU, CPU

Ethereum is the second-largest and most popular cryptocurrency, potentially what people jump to when they realize Bitcoin is going to be too difficult to mine without massive mining rig farms. However, just like Bitcoin, there are a huge number of people already mining Ethereum, and with more people comes more complexity, time, and power required to get each coin. Getting started with Ethereum Mining is fairly easy. All you need to start mining Ether is a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU).

It uses a proof-of-work hashing function called Ethash, and it can be profitable to set up mining with this cryptocurrency if your rig farm is big enough or you use pooled mining; you could also rent cloud mining servers to try to make it profitable with a large enough supply.

How profitable is ethereum mining? One of the big advantages is that Ethereum is stable to a large degree, so even if the mining takes a little longer, it’s extremely profitable, and you don’t need to worry about huge dips as much as with small cryptocurrencies.

Is it still profitable to mine ethereum? Overall it’s challenging to mine but still more profitable than trying to mine Bitcoin. You will, however, need to join a mining pool or create a very large mining farm of your own to get anywhere in the near future with this coin.

Ethereum Classic (ETC)

• Block Time: 13 seconds
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU, CPU

In 2016, Ethereum performed a hard fork due to a DAO attack, and Ethereum Classic is the original code that has been slightly modified and upgraded to become new crypto. Ethereum Classic mining is pretty easy with a GPU or even a CPU; however, there are significant processing power requirements that make it a little pricey to get into for a beginner miner.

Profitability Eethereum Classic? It’s predicted to be a stable and reliable coin, with a current market cap of 6 billion USD, so it’s a good long-term investment for any crypt miners that can match the computational requirements of the coin.

It’s a great and lesser-known alternative to Ethereum that won’t provide the same rewards but will provide easier entry than trying to mine one of the biggest cryptos in the world.

Monacoin (MONA)

• Block Time: 15 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU

Monacoin was forked from Litecoin (which was forked from Bitcoin) and used proof-of-work with a Lyra2RE(v2) hashing algorithm. It’s great crypto to mine with a GPU, and you only need a hardware wallet and device to deal with Monacoin mining process.

It’s not an extremely popular coin yet, so it’s a good opportunity to get in early to mine coins before the big farms and many other users find it. One of the biggest issues in Monacoin mining profitability is that the price is low, and without some big movement or investment, it may be some time before that price goes up.

Vertcoin (VTC)

• Block Time: 2.5 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU

Vertcoin uses proof-of-work with a Lyra2REv3 hashing algorithm. How to mine Vertcoin? It’s another ASIC-resistant coin, Vertcoin mining requirements are pretty simple, so you’ll need a GPU or even CPU to mine the coin. It’s been built this way so that there is an even distribution of coins, rather than ASIC-mining farms trying to monopolize the coin, as seen in many other coins.

The primary idea from Vertcoin developers is to keep the coin as decentralized as possible, and large ASIC mining farms make that impossible to do. So this is a core component of Vertcoin mining that should stick around, which makes it a safe and good option for individual miners to get involved.

Based on the mining hardware hashrate of 2.50 MH/s Vertcoin profitability still make sense.

ZCash (ZEC)

• Block Time: 1.15 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU, CPU

ZCash has a heavy lean towards privacy from the company that developers it, and it’s ASIC-resistant, so you’ll need a GPU or CPU to mine this crypto.

Is zcash mining profitable? The coin has a reasonably high price, and being that its ASIC-resistant, it’s worth it for individual miners to make quite a bit of money. The coin is very stable and reliable, so you won’t lose your rewards through a significant dip, and this could be a good long-term investment if you’re willing to hold.

Grin (GRIN)

• Block Time: 1 minute
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU

Grin is open-source, community-driven crypto, and every minute a block is mined, producing 60 grins or coins per minute indefinitely. The rewards are fixed, but you know what you’re getting when you start and won’t see diminishing returns as time goes along.

Grin isn’t highly popular or used crypto, but it has a big community of people trying to push its use as more than an investment vehicle. Because it’s less popular, it also means less competition and is easier to mine right now.

In some situations, you could be making $24 per hour worth of Grin, so if you can find a use for it or can cash it out, it’s extremely rewarding crypto to be mining.

Monero (XMR)

• Block Time: 2 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU

Monero was created in 2014 and has had many other cryptos fork it for its features. It’s dedicated to privacy and security and uses the CryptoNote protocol and RandomX hash algorithm. It’s highly resistant to ASIC-based mining, so a GPU setup would be required for the best mining results.

There is no limit on the supply of Monero coins, so the complexity of calculations doesn’t increase at any point, making it a stable mining coin, which is one of the problems with Bitcoin mining these days.

It’s ranked in the top 50 cryptos by market cap, going as low as 44 recently. It has a lot of potential as a long-term mining investment coin and is very profitable to mine right now.

RavenCoin (RVN)

• Block Time: 1 minute
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU

RavenCoin is backed by the KAWPOW algorithm, and it’s extremely easy to mine with GPUs, so it’s an excellent choice for beginner crypto miners, and because it’s ranked in the top 100 cryptos by market cap, the rewards are highly beneficial now, and in the future, as prices continue to rise.

Dash (DASH)

• Block Time: 2.5 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: ASIC

Dash was a fork of Bitcoin back in 2014; it started life being called Darkcoin but appears to be going more corporate now with the name change. The goal of Dash is to provide anonymous, decentralized payments for a huge number of people as quickly as possible.

Dash incorporates 11 proof-of-work algorithms in a hash called X11. It’s one of the safest and most secure cryptos around and could be one of the contenders to take over secure transactions in Web 3.0. You would need to crack all 11 algorithms simultaneously to interfere with Dash transactions.

Dash provides near-instant transactions, and the power used for transactions is 30% lower than what BTC offers today, making it a more secure and greener option for crypto transactions.

A real financial model and goal make Dash a profitable crypto to mine, as it’s not going anywhere in the near future, and prices continue to rise.

DigiByte (DGB)

• Block Time: 1.25 min
• Best Mining Hardware: ASIC, GPU, CPU

DigiByte is a newer crypto that focuses on secure digital payments and decentralized apps (dApps) for the future of Web 3.0.

DGB utilized UTXO technology, which incorporates five different algorithms for transactions on the network, which is primarily for the security of the transactions.

You’ve got a few options for mining, including ASIC, GPU, or CPU, so no matter what type of mining hardware you have, it can be profitable to mine DGB.

Litecoin (LTC)

• Block Time: ~2.5 min
• Best Mining Hardware: ASIC, GPU

Litecoin started its existence with the goal to be a lighter and better version of Bitcoin, and it continues to have similar features but focuses on speed; it’s currently four times faster than BTC but also much cheaper to buy.

LTC uses a proof-of-work hashing algorithm called Scrypt, and this opens up the opportunity for you to mine LTC with a GPU without having to invest in a specialty ASIC device.

You will need a powerful system to mine Litecoin effectively; otherwise, you’ll just be wasting your time, but the rewards for mining can be very high and well worth the investment.

Easiest Cryptos To Mine

When you start with crypto mining, it’s often worthwhile to test out your rig and your overall operation by using one of the easier cryptos to mine. You can also find that with ease comes faster profits, so with a smaller rig, you may be able to make a little profit without burning out your machine.

Many people will mine the easiest cryptos so they can make enough just to cover their power bills and a few expenses each month. This can easily be done without setting up complex or dedicated mining rigs.

Listed below are the easiest cryptocurrencies to mine.

Aeon (AEON)

• Block Time: 240 seconds
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU, CPU

Aeon was forked from Monero; it’s private, secure, and untraceable. It’s one of the easiest cryptos to mine because there is limited competition from anybody else trying to mine it, but the profits are extremely low.

So if your goal is profit, this is not a good option, but if you’re looking for a little extra pocket change or just want to get the hang of crypto mining, then it’s a great starter crypto.

SweatCoin

• Block Time: ~ 6 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: Your own body

SweatCoin runs in the background of your mobile device and connects to its ability to track your walking throughout the day. So instead of using a GPU, ASIC, or CPU hardware mining operation, you’re awarded 1 SweatCoin for every 1 km you walk in a day.

If you’re running, the rewards are lower, but you can get them faster, which means you ultimately get more out of running for long periods.

As far as easy goes, it doesn’t get easier than going for a walk with your phone in your pocket and getting crypto coins for doing it.

Dogecoin (DOGE)

• Block Time: 1 minute
• Best Mining Hardware: ASIC

How to mine Dogecoin? Dogecoin can be best mined with an ASIC device, but that doesn’t mean you can’t put your GPU to work on the Scrypt mining algorithm. Doge is actually one of the potentially most profitable “easy” cryptos to mine. The expectation for Dogecoin is to keep going up, so if you’re able to work and hold your Dogecoin, it could be worth a lot more in the future.

How to make money with Dogecoin? Dogecoin mining may not be as profitable right now if you’re solo mining, so if you want faster profits, then joining a mining pool or creating a larger mining farm may be a better option for you.

Bitcoin Gold (BTG)

• Block Time: 10 minutes
• Best Mining Hardware: GPU

Bitcoin Gold was a fork of the original Bitcoin; it uses a proof-of-work hashing algorithm, Equihash, and Zhash. Bitcoin Gold developers sore an issue with large-scale miners controlling the mining of Bitcoin and making it a monopoly, which goes against the ideas of decentralization and independence.

Is Bitcoin Gold mining profitable? Bitcoin Gold is an ideal crypto for solo mining with a GPU, and it opens up opportunities for newer miners to get their feet wet and make a little profit. Luckily, when you’re working with GPUs, you don’t have to specialize in any specific crypto, and if you want, you can move on to other cryptos once you’ve tested the waters with Bitcoin Gold.

Final Thoughts On Crypto Mining

There are a huge number of cryptos in the world, with more being added constantly. You need to do some research on which coins are profitable, have the least resources and costs needed for you, and also need to consider whether the coin will be sticking around.

If you mine a coin with great profitability, but it disappears, or the price drops suddenly, then your profits are worthwhile, which is a big risk when dealing with smaller or newer cryptos. You also need to consider if you can convert that crypto to something else or exchange it for real-world cash. If you’re stuck with the coin after mining it, then what will you actually do with it?

It’s important to research your coin and determine if it’s profitable and worthwhile for you personally. Make sure you factor in what you can actually do with the coin afterward because you will be spending real-world money on power and the rig, so you need to recoup these costs at some point.

If you feel like mining may not be for you, you can still get involved with cryptos by purchasing them on CardToCrypto with the money you would be spending on your rig and power every month; it may be more profitable just to buy the coins.

Crypto Mining Frequently Asked Questions

Why Is Mining Bitcoin A Bad Idea?

Bitcoin is the most well-known cryptocurrency globally; if people only know one, it will be Bitcoin. As a result, most newer miners may try to jump into Bitcoin mining without doing much research. However, profitability on Bitcoin mining will be terrible in 2022, so people quickly discover that and move on to more profitable cryptos.

Bitcoin isn’t profitable to mine due to a number of reasons. Bitcoin is the most popular, so there is heavy competition when mining it; you will need significant resources to mine and turn a profit with Bitcoin. You’ll also find that Bitcoin's price goes up, but the reward for mining is going down.

With Bitcoin reaching its upper limit of coins, the computational power required continues to go up, which increases costs on power and the rigs required to mine Bitcoin.

Is bitcoin mining profitable in 2022? Ultimately Bitcoin is a great investment, and big players in the mining industry may be able to make a profit on it, but regular users and even large mining farms just can’t compete, and with the rewards becoming less and less, there is just poor ROI for Bitcoin.

Is It Still Profitable To Mine Crypto?

Mining crypto can be incredibly profitable; it’s just become more challenging with more expense required to pull out the profits you want. You’re also competing against more people that also want to make profits.

Currently, to be profitable with mining crypto, you’ll need to join a mining pool or create a crypto mining farm of your own and keep adding to it with the profits you make.

What’s the Best Crypto To Mine In 2022?

It’s impossible to say which is the best crypto to mine because everybody's situation will be different. Are you able to create a huge mining farm of ASIC servers, or do you only have a single server with a GPU attached?

The best crypto to mine in 2022 will be the one that gives you the most profits for the least cost. So review all major cryptos to see which will be profitable to you or allow you to hit your goals.

Best coin to mine after Ethereum? Currently significantly less profitable coins for mining is Conflux, Ethereum Classic, Ergo, Firo, Ravencoin and others.

What Is The Easiest Crypto To Mine?

SweatCoin is the easiest crypto to mine as you don’t need to do anything except get up and start moving. There is no special equipment needed, and nothing needs to be solved.

For traditional crypto mining, Electroneum is potentially the easiest to mine right now; it’s as simple as setting it up on your phone and letting it run.

Easy can mean profit, but it can also just mean easy and fun. So depending on what your goals are, you should assess the easiest with the return that makes it worthwhile for you.

Is Ethereum Mining Still Worth It In 2022?

Ethereum mining can still be profitable even with the high competition and large mining farms working on it. As a single miner with a CPU rig, it’s likely not going to be worth it for you, but if you join a mining pool or create a mining rig farm of your own, it can be profitable.

Disclaimer:

The information provided in this article is not financial advice or advice on what cryptocurrencies you should be investing in. The information is provided for informational purposes only and is the author’s personal opinion which should be vetted against your own personal research.

There are no warranties or guarantees about the accuracy or completeness of the information provided in this article.

The cryptocurrency markets are highly volatile and changing constantly. While every effort has been made to keep this article accurate, things change quickly, and it’s impossible to predict what will happen in the crypto market one week, one month, and certainly not one year from now.

As an investor, trader, or crypto enthusiast, you are encouraged to pull information from various sources and make your own judgments and decisions that are best for you.