Today we are going to show you how to mine Ethereum in a pool. If you want to mine cryptocurrencies, one of the options to get profits is to join pools to mine Ethereum. But what should we take into account when choosing a pool or is it profitable to do so?
The first thing we should ask ourselves is, is it necessary to join a pool to mine cryptocurrencies? It is not necessary, but it is common for miners to join these pools or groups of “participants” who work together to find blocks. Then, they share the reward. In exchange for letting you belong to the pool, they receive a commission on everything mined by you.
How to mine Ethereum in a pool?
Tips before mining Ethereum in a pool
Hashrate: The hashrate is the unit of measurement of the processing power of cryptocurrencies. It is a fundamental concept if you want to try your luck mining cryptocurrencies and indicates the number of computational operations that the network of miners (or a miner itself) is able to perform. It measures the hashrate of each of your computers or workers but also the total of the whole pool.
Commission: How much is the commission we would earn for being part of such a pool? Normally it is very similar in all of them but we can check the differences. It is usually between 1% and 5% although you can check it before joining a pool and it usually does not exceed 2%.
Operating systems: It must be compatible with our operating system. Ethereum mining pools work with clients that we must download and most of them work on all operating systems but some are designed only for Windows.
Size or participants: The reward obtained is distributed among all users of a pool to mine Ethereum so the size or the number of participants can be important when choosing one or another. The more participants, the more people to distribute.
How to use an Ethereum pool?
We share some of the most popular pools for this purpose.
Ethermine
Ethermine is one of the most recommended pools for Ethereum. Without the need to register you can see all the details of the platform such as the hashrate currently, the miners that are active, the blocks obtained or the price. You can see the mined blocks in real-time from its main website and it has no commission for withdrawing funds. In addition, you can check their statistics page where you will see the hashrate by days and hours in total or in each of the continents. You will also see the number of blocks obtained.
To join Ethermine you simply go to their home page and go to “Start mining” at the top right of the screen. Here you can choose the mining software you want to download for Windows or Linux depending on whether you have an NVIDIA or AMD graphics card and has servers in Europe, Asia and the United States. You must download the program, edit the .bat file and add in it your Ethereum address. Then, you run the app and you are a part of the pool. You can choose the server you want or you can let the default one.
Once you are part of this pool, you will have a panel where you will see all the necessary details. At the top, you will find the number of workers or teams you have active or inactive, what you have mined and what is still pending to be paid, or the estimated earnings. You will also be able to see the hashrate of each team in detail.
A fundamental tip for mining Ethereum or any other cryptocurrency is to optimize resources. You can use programs like MSI Afterburner to optimize the graphics card. By lowering the GPU frequency (core clock) and the consumption of the graphics card you can get less temperature and less heat in the computer you are using to mine. You can lower the GPU frequency without affecting the mining and you can improve the fan speed.
NiceHash
Along with the previous one, NiceHash is one of the most popular pools for mining Bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. You can choose between mining with CPU/GPU or mining with ASIC and it has all the detailed information according to the hardware you use: what would be the daily earnings, electricity cost, consumption, efficiency and net profit obtained.
The operation is simple and you just have to go to “Start mining” and choose between GPU/CPU or ASIC machine. We choose the first option and we will see tutorials and videos explaining how to do it step by step. Simply download the trial software and follow the steps. It is compatible with Windows and Linux, with NVIDIA and AMD graphics.
F2Pool
Another interesting choice is F2Pool. Because it is great for beginners. Using F2Pool you can watch a tutorial to start mining. Also, from the main screen, you can see the details of Ethereum price and hashrate, daily revenue estimate, commission or payout threshold.
Sparkpool
Another mining pool is called Sparpool but you can also mine other cryptocurrencies in this one. It has two modes: anonymous or public. If you want to do it anonymously you don’t have to register and the earnings will be automatically transferred to your wallet.
From the statistics section, you will see the number of miners, the number of workers or devices that are mining or the reward percentage (of 1%). Here you can also check the payout time and the settlement date. Sparkpool servers are located in Europe, China, Japan or the United States.
