Ethereum Merge invites miners and mining pools to make a choice

Ethereum to PoS merger is scheduled for the third week of September, eliminating PoW mining. Experts assess the impact on mining pools and miners.

The Ethereum blockchain is ready to make its long-awaited transition from its current proof-of-work (PoW) consensus mining to proof-of-stake (PoS). The merge date is officially scheduled for September 15-16 after the successful final integration of the Goerli testnet into the Beacon chain on August 11.

Currently, miners can create new Ether (ETH) by promising a huge amount of computing power. After the merger, however, participants in the network, called validators, will instead have to pledge large amounts of preexisting ETH to validate blocks, create more ETH, and earn staking rewards.

The three-phase transition process began on December 1, 2020, with the launch of the Beacon channel. Phase 0 of the process marked the beginning of the PoS transition, where validators started staking their ETH for the first time. However, phase 0 did not impact the Ethereum mainnet.

Total terminal difficulty has been set to 587500000000000000000000.

This means that the Ethereum PoW network now has a (roughly) fixed number of hashes to mine. https://t.co/3um744WkxZ predicts that the merger will take place around September 15, although the exact date depends on the hashrate. pic.twitter.com/9YnloTWSi1

Phase 1, the integration of the Beacon Chain with the current Ethereum mainnet was planned for mid-2021; however, due to several delays and unfinished work on the developer's side, it has been postponed to early 2022. Phase 1 is ready for completion...