Is Bitcoin decentralized, and who controls it?
Bitcoin is often described as the most decentralized blockchain. This is due to the way its consensus mechanism, Proof-of-Work (PoW), distributes the right to manage the network among various unconnected miner nodes.
The Bitcoin protocol is even referred to as the "gold standard of decentralization," and its network is considered a benchmark despite its performance and scalability limitations. Let us examine whether Bitcoin is truly decentralized and whether miners can take control of the blockchain.
Largest mining pools
In pursuit of hashrate* — the network's computing power — mining farms often join together into large pools. The greater the combined computing power of a mining pool*, the higher the probability that it will mine the next Bitcoin block.
* Hashrate is the total computing power of the mining equipment participating in the creation of a new block. Hashrate indicates how many calculation attempts a miner, mining pool, or the entire network can perform in one second. The higher the network's hashrate, the more computing resources a potential attacker would need to influence the block creation process.
* A mining pool is an organizational and technical association of independent miners who direct their computing power toward jointly searching for new blocks. The pool server distributes individual computing tasks among participants, creates the block template, and records each miner's contribution using so-called shares. If the pool finds a valid block, the resulting reward, consisting of newly issued bitcoins and transaction fees, is distributed among the pool participants according to the rules of the selected payout model.
According to Mining Pool Stats, the Bitcoin network includes more than 140 mining pools. On the one hand, the greater the number of such pools, the higher the level of Bitcoin decentralization, since this distribution of hashrate makes it virtually impossible for any single pool to gain control over the blockchain.
However, the three largest mining pools alone control more than half of the Bitcoin network's total hashrate, which, according to experts, poses a threat to its decentralization. Below are the five largest mining pools, which account for a significant share of the network's computing power.
1. Foundry USA
As of July 2026, Foundry USA is the largest mining pool in the world. According to Mining Pool Stats, the pool controls more than 24% of the Bitcoin network's total hashrate. Foundry USA's combined hashrate exceeds 250 EH/s — exahashes* per second.
* An exahash is a unit used to measure the number of cryptographic calculations. One exahash equals (10^{18}), or one quintillion hashes.
The Foundry USA mining pool was launched in 2019 by the well-known venture capital company Digital Currency Group (DCG). The same company owns Grayscale Investments, which was among the first companies to launch a spot Bitcoin ETF* in 2024.
* An ETF — Exchange-Traded Fund — is an investment fund whose units or shares are freely traded on a stock exchange in the same way as ordinary securities. The fund creates a portfolio of specific assets, such as stocks, bonds, commodities, or cryptocurrencies, and the value of its shares generally reflects the performance of that portfolio. By purchasing ETF shares, an investor can benefit from changes in the value of the underlying assets but, as a rule, does not become their direct owner.
The Foundry USA pool was initially focused on institutional participants and industrial miners. However, it later introduced the option for smaller network participants to join.
2. Antpool
Antpool is the second-largest mining pool after Foundry USA. It was launched back in 2014 and is one of the oldest mining pools in the industry. It currently controls more than 16% of the Bitcoin network's total hashrate, or approximately 171 EH/s.
The Antpool mining pool is owned by Bitmain, the world's leading manufacturer of cryptocurrency mining equipment.
3. F2Pool
F2Pool is among the three leading mining pools by hashrate. As of July 2026, its hashrate reaches almost 147 EH/s, accounting for approximately 14% of the Bitcoin network's total hashrate.
F2Pool was originally launched even earlier than Antpool, in 2013. During its first years of operation, F2Pool was the largest mining pool, but it later lost its leading position to Foundry USA and Antpool.
4. ViaBTC
The ViaBTC pool was launched in 2016, and in 2026 it ranks among the four largest mining pools by hashrate, accounting for more than 7% of the total figure. ViaBTC's hashrate exceeds 77 EH/s.
ViaBTC is headquartered in China. However, due to restrictions imposed by government regulators, the company redistributed its computing capacity across several countries in Europe, Asia, and the CIS.
5. Binance
The mining pool owned by Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange, ranks among the five leading pools by hashrate. The Binance mining pool accounts for approximately 7% of the Bitcoin network's total hashrate.
Is Bitcoin's decentralization under threat?
According to experts, the threat to Bitcoin's decentralization is becoming increasingly real amid the growing influence of large mining pools. According to D-Central, the Nakamoto coefficient* stood at 3 during the first half of 2026. This means that only three mining pools would need to cooperate to control the majority of blocks mined on the Bitcoin network.
* The Nakamoto coefficient is a measure of network decentralization that reflects the minimum number of independent participants that would need to cooperate to gain critical influence over one of the network's components. For Bitcoin, it is usually calculated based on the number of the largest mining pools that collectively control more than 50% of the hashrate.
However, experts also note that a distinction must be made between control over the Bitcoin network's hashrate and control over the protocol itself. Large mining pools certainly gain greater influence over the mining of new blocks: they create the block template and determine which transactions will be included in it.
However, regardless of their share of the hashrate, large mining pools still cannot rewrite the operating rules of the Bitcoin protocol. They cannot increase the issuance volume, remove protocol restrictions, or force independent nodes to accept invalid blocks.
The main risk is not control over the protocol itself but the concentration of computing power. The greater the share of mining concentrated among several large pools, the stronger their influence over block creation and transaction inclusion. Therefore, Bitcoin remains decentralized at the level of network rules, but its mining infrastructure is gradually becoming more centralized.
Thus, the real threat to Bitcoin is not a literal takeover of the network but a reduction in the number of independent operators. The more large miners control block production, the easier it becomes to exert pressure on them. This creates a risk of transaction censorship: under pressure, miners may refuse to include certain transactions in blocks.
Financial analyst and WhaleWire co-founder Jacob King believes that, as a result, the Bitcoin network is becoming increasingly less decentralized. Statistics support this: in August 2025, the largest mining pool, Foundry USA, mined eight consecutive blocks, an unprecedented event for the leading blockchain.
According to analysts, one of the conditions required to preserve Bitcoin's decentralization is the distribution of computing power. The more pools located in different regions participate in cryptocurrency mining, the more difficult it becomes to manipulate the network, including through sanctions pressure.
The availability of energy sources for mining also influences Bitcoin's decentralization. An important factor is the development of "green" or "environmentally friendly" mining using renewable energy sources.
The use of solar, wind, hydroelectric power, and other renewable energy sources makes it possible to locate mining capacity in a greater number of regions, including areas where conventional electricity is too expensive or unavailable. The more geographically distributed miners are, the less the network depends on individual countries, energy companies, and large industrial operators.
According to Binance, the share of renewable energy sources used to mine the first cryptocurrency is growing by an average of 5.8% per year.