Which Algorithm Can you Mine?

One of the first questions anyone in crypto gets when talking to someone not involved in bitcoin is: “Where do bitcoins come from?”. Well, explaining that it is SHA256D based proof of work wouldn’t help. In this article we will be looking at some algorithms that are used in various coins, and which use those algorithms have.

The algorithm used in bitcoin is SHA256D (double). In the beginning of bitcoin, there was no other way to mine bitcoin, then using a cpu (central processing unit). After a while there came GPU miners (graphical processing unit) using CUDA and OpenCL, fpga’s (field-programmable gate arrays) and now we have ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits). For obvious reasons, CPU and GPU mining of bitcoin (or any SHA256D-coin) is being surpassed with the use of ASICs, allowing a far higher highrate to power ratio.

But there are also other algorithms. Each with specific advantages and disadvantages. Scrypt also was originally used to be ASIC hostile, allowing GPU miners to still mine something worth the power cost.

Some algorithms have advantages in speed, security complexity, heat production, some in the targeted miners (heavy (memory) operations  targeting specific platforms), ASIC hostility or just to reduce the gap between CPU and GPU hashing.

There coins that use a mix of certain algorithms (Quark/ZF5), and coins that use a chain with multiple algorithms (MyriadCoin, using: SHA256, Scrypt, Qubit, Skein or Groestl), as well as coins that hardforked somewhere along the line and changed the algorithm used. (FTC/VRT). To illustrate the fast list of different algorithms, I compiled a table with every algorithm I could find that was used for a certain coin.

 Please note this table is not and will never be either complete nor 100% accurate, and is provided as a starting point.

Algorithm	Coin(s)	Miner(s)
SHA256D	Bitcoin (BTC), NameCoin (NMC), Devcoin (DVC), IxCoin (IXC)	Cgminer/bfgminer/cudaminer
Scrypt	Dogecoin,Litecoin, Worldcoin, Reddcoin (and much more)	Cgminer/bfgminer/Sgminer
Keccak	MaxCoin (MAX), Slothcoin (SLOTH), Cryptometh (METH)	Cgminer-keccak/Sgminer/CudaMiner/ccMiner
Groestl	Groestlcoin	SGMiner
Skein	Skeincoin (SKC)	Cgminer-skein
Blake	BlakeBitcoin, Blakecoin (BLC), Dirac (XDQ), Electron (ELT), Photon (PHO)	Cgminer-alt/CUDAminer/ccMiner
Fresh	FreshCoin (FRSH)	Sgminer/ccMiner
Lyra2RE	Vertcoin (VRT)	Sgminer/ccminer
M7M	Coinmagi (XMG)	Wolf-m7m-cpuminer-V2 / minerdlegacy
N-Scrypt (Scrypt Adaptive-N)	Vertcoin (VTC), ExeCoin (EXE), GPUcoin (GPUC), ParallaxCoin (PLX), SiliconValleyCoin (XSV)	VertMiner/CudaMiner
NeoScrypt	FTC	Cpuminer-neoscrypt
NIST5	Talkcoin.	CcMiner/Sgminer
Pluck	Supcoin (SUP)	CcMiner/Sgminer
Quark	QuarkCoin, Securecoin	Sph-sgminer/ccminer
Qubit	Qubit (Q2C)	sgminer
Scrypt-Jane	YaCoin (YAC), Ultracoin (UTC), Velocitycoin (VEL	YacMiner/CudaMiner
YeScrypt	Globalboostcoin ($BSTY)	CcMiner/Sgminer
ZF5	ZiftrCoin	CcMiner/Sgminer
HEFTY1	Heavycoin (HVC), Mjollnircoin (MNR)	Cgminer-HVC/cgminer-MNR/ccMiner
Cryptonite	DarkNote	InwalletMiner
X11	DarkCoin (DRK), Hirocoin (HIRO), X11coin (XC)	Sph-sgminer X11mod//ccMiner
X13	MaruCoin (MARU), BoostCoin (BOST), X13Coin (X13C)	Sph-sgminer X13mod/ccMiner
X15 / BitBlock	Procoin (PRO) Bitblock	Sgminer
Whirlpool	(WHRL) WhirlCoin	Cpuminer-whirpool/Sgminer/ccminer

Sph-sgminer: https://github.com/prettyhatemachine/sph-sgminer

sg-miner: https://github.com/badman74/sgminer

ccMiner: https://github.com/cbuchner1/ccminer

So what do I mine?

Because most people would like to mine the most profitable coin, there are services like multipool.us. Where you can mine a certain algorithm (for example scrypt). And it will idiomatically switch to the most profitable coin using that algorithm (SHA256, Scrypt, X11 are supported). In combination with auto-withdrawal from the mining pool and auto-sell on incoming deposit on your exchange, you can have your mined coins sold for BTC. An other option is to use a website like coinwarz.com or altcoinprofitability.com, that show which coin is most profitable for each algorithm.

If you really can’t figure out what to mine, you can always rent out your rig. Using a service like Miningrigrentals, Leaserigs, Betarigs, or Nicehash. Where you can point your miner to their stratum url, and set a pool for the time your rig is not rented. Leaserig only supports SHA256,X11, and scrypt coins, whereas Miningrigrentals, BetaRigs and Nicehash support almost all hashing functions.

Something we see at Nicehash is that they provide their own build of sgminer-5.0, which has algorithm switching. In the miningconfig you can set your rate speeds for each algorithm you want to mine. And it will start renting out your rig, at the most profitable algorithm, and will switch algorithms when the profitability changes. More info here.

Finding the best algorithm to mine also depends on your hardware. AMD (cgMiner/sgminer) and Nvidia gpus (Cudaminer/ccminer) both have a favor for certain algorithms, also some algorithms use less power and produce less heat from the GPU.

Written by:

Michiel Biersteker