How to Mine Litecoin
Litecoin, or the silver coin, is the most popular hard fork of Bitcoin. This coin is based on the Scrypt algorithm, which is more memory intensive, thus allowing Litecoin mining with cheaper hardware. In this article, we’ll explain how to mine Litecoin with maximum profit. You’re about to learn how to pick out the best hardware, configure your setup and journey into the world of crypto. Here’s a short summary of what is covered in our piece of content: …more
- Mining Hardware and Software
- Setup and Configuration Guide
- Recommended LTC Mining Pool
The mining can be also achived with rented hardware. If you dont want to care about all the setup questions you can consider using a cloud mining service.
Why You Should Mine Litecoin?
- Litecoin is a proven payment tool in many instances. A lot of websites are offering payment services based on LTC, but keep in mind that its price can be volatile, much like any other crypto coin.
- Easy to integrate into existing applications that already support Bitcoin. It is better for small-size purchases because where Bitcoin blocks are solved and generated every 10 minutes, Litecoin ones are done within 2.5 minutes making all transaction confirmations faster.
- Litecoin is currently the #4 mineable cryptocurrency in regards of market size due to its easy integration, popularity and high liquidity. This gives it flexibility to be on almost every crypto coin exchange making it a great investment.
Best way to mine Litecoin
The best way to mine Litecoin is with ASIC miners and in a mining pool. In these pools, users combine their hashing power, thus increasing the chance of a reward. When the pool finds and solves a block, the rewards are distributed among its members depending on the reward system in that pool and the contribution of each miner. Most pools are anonymous, and they don’t need registration.
What do You Need to Start Mining Litecoin?
To achieve the best possible LTC profit, you should take the ASIC miner route. They have the hashing power to ensure stable income through time. You would need a power supply for the machine and decent internet connection, if possible an unlimited traffic one. Either way, you must provide a minimum of 500MB traffic per machine, per month. You should consider the total power draw depending on how many devices you install, otherwise you may damage your equipment and incur significant monetary loses. After all, you can get a much less expensive paperweight if you need one. The last requirement is a Litecoin Wallet (here you will find the latest download of the official Litecoin wallet), to manage your coins, and you are ready to get started.
To summarize what you need:
- Mining Hardware (GPU or ASIC)
- Internet Connection with at least 1MB/s Bandwidth
- Power grid with enough capacity for your machines
- A Litecoin Wallet
What Else You Should Consider
As you’re already aware, mining Litecoin requires a hardware, but as any other device you should pay attention to maintenance, so it could work properly longer. If you are looking to purchase only one machine you will be able to find a place for it and use it in a domestic environment, but in case you are looking to assemble a “farm” with more machines, you should take into considerations the following:
- Heat – Since the machines are working 24/7 and they run hot, it is no surprise that heat dissipation could be an issue. The trick is to get a proper cooling system and ventilation in the room.
- Noise suppression – Installing a proper cooling solution can be quite noisy in addition to the hardware being loud, so it’s best to think of it in advance.
- Regular maintenance – Amortization is inevitable, it is best if you purchase spare parts in advance because it will be cheaper when you buy them in bulk and you’ll reduce your down time.
For more information, visit our hardware/cooling web page.
Which Litecoin Mining Hardware to buy?
Now that you’re willing to invest in Litecoin mining equipment, we’ll go over your options. Due to the nature of ASIC devices, you don`t have to assemble or configure Litecoin mining rigs with multiple graphic cards, like it was in the past. All you need to do is choose an ASIC that works with Scrypt, Litecoin’s hashing algorithm. We suggest looking for the best price/performance ratio that would meet your needs. You should keep an eye on the hash rate, power consumption and the price for the device. The most popular Litecoin ASIC miners are:
recommended Litecoin mining hardware
Using our Litecoin mining calculator you can check how many coins you would be able to mine for a certain period of time and how much money they are equal to. Take into consideration how many kilowatts your hardware setup consumes and what your local electricity prices are. Afterwards, it is up to you – do you see yourself breaking even and making a profit, are you willing to wait that long? Only you can decide.
Software and Hardware Configuration
Let us show you the ultimate guide on how to setup your Litecoin miner and start mining now.
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01. Connect Your Litecoin Mining Hardware to Electricity and Internet
First you need to connect the ASIC miner with its power supply. The connectors are the same, but make sure you insert every plug. You also need to connect the PSU to the power grid and plug a LAN cable into the RJ45 socket on the miner.
Plug an internet cable into your RJ45’s designated standard port on your miner. -
02. Choose a LTC Mining Pool
When you choose a mining pool, take under consideration what the pool fee is and what reward system or payment method is used. Here is a list with the top 3 Litecoin mining pools:
Antpool
Server locations:
.Reward system: PPLNSAverage fee: 0.0%Our choiceLitecoinpool
Server locations:
. . .Reward system: PPSAverage fee: 4%F2pool
Server locations:
. .Reward system: PPSAverage fee: 4%You can visit our mining pools page to understand more about pools, fees and reward systems.
After selecting the pool you want to join, you can proceed to the next step – configuring your workers. We will take the f2pool and Antminer L3 + for example.
Visit the official web site www.f2pool.com and register yourself, by clicking on the top right corner. You don’t need to register workers for this mining pool in particular.
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03. Find the IP address of the Miner
If you have access to your DHCP server, you can easily find the Litecoin’s miner IP address in the clients table. You can identify it by the hostname “Antminer”.
If you don’t have such an access to your router another option is to download the IP software reporter from the device manufacturer. After unzipping the file, double click on the IP Reporter and you will see the following window, where you should click “START”.
After that, click and hold the button marked “IP Reporter” on the ASIC device and if everything is fine, you will see a pop-up on the computer with the IP address of the machine. (remember that you should be in the same local network to use this method)
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04. Login the Web Interface of the Miner
Once you know the IP address of the ASIC miner, the next step is to open your browser and enter the address in the URL field (in our case is 192.168.1.18). A dialog box is asking for username and password for login. By default, they are both “root”. Consult your user manual if needed.
Login Page 
The Login can differ from Hardware to Hardware. Check the manual of your miner to find the right login credentials. After successful login click on Miner Configuration page where you can enter the pool information.
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05. Enter the Mining Pool Information
Having successfully logged in, go to Miner Configuration/General Settings and enter the pool addresses from the mining pool website. You can fill all the three possible sections to use the failover function if one of the pools not respond or stopped working.
Examples:
pool url: stratum+tcp://stratum.f2pool.com:8888
worker: yourpoolusername.yourworkername (johnsmith.worker01)
password: 123 or leave blank
pool url: stratum+tcp://stratum.f2pool.com:3335
worker: yourpoolusername.yourworkername (johnsmith.worker01)
password: 123 or leave blank
Settings window 
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06. Click Save & Apply
In a few minutes, you can check the section “Miner status” for status information. If you see the hash rate in “Summary”, your ASIC is working properly.
Litecoin Cloud Mining
Litecoin cloud mining presents another opportunity to mine, without any investment in mining equipment. How is that possible, you might ask? These types of platforms are like a market place, both for selling and buying hashing power, in exchange for a subscription fee. The most reliable and reputable providers are NiceHash, MinerGate, Genesis mining. Using 3rd party mining gear will save you a lot of money for maintenance, electricity and of course the main investment for the equipment itself.
Depending on the type of contract you sign, you can easily swap between coins or algorithms. It is a great opportunity to explore the market of cryptocurrencies and build a foundation of knowledge about it. If you’re satisfied with the results or feel sure enough of your knowledge of crypto, you can in turn create your own mining operation.
Litecoin Calculator
With the help of our Litecoin mining calculator, you can determine how profitable your mining setup is and how much coins you are going to mine for a certain period. Once you fill in the required values for hash rate, power consumption, price per kW/h and pool fee you are going to find out what profitability you can expect in the future.
Disclaimer: The result from our calculator is approximate and only applies for the current difficulty of the network, block reward and current LTC price. Any changes of these parameters will result to changes in your profitability in any direction.
For cloud mining you should enter your hash rate and pool fee to calculate estimated earnings.
FAQ
How long does it take to mine 1 LTC?
It depends on the hardware you are going to buy and what hash rate you’d be able to achieve.
How much you can mine at one day?
Depends on your hash power, network difficulty and whether or not you’re mining in a pool.
Is it profitable?
Using our Litecoin mining calculator, you will be able to determine that for yourself. Every case is different and there’s no universal answer.
Can I mine with my iPhone?
It is possible but not profitable at all and there’s a risk of it overheating.
Where to get Litecoin mining software?
You don`t have to search for software. The mining is performed with an ASIC device and the software is integrated in it.
Is it legal?
Absolutely, yes.
How do I know how much I will earn?
You can use our Litecoin mining calculator to find out.
Which Litecoin wallet to use?
You can use any Litecoin compatible wallet. Please visit our wallets page for more details.
Is it possible to mine at Raspberry Pi?
This is possible, but you will not make a money.
Which algorithm is used in Litecoin mining?
Litecoin is based on proof of work algorithm Scrypt.
How to make your own pool?
Visit setting up your own pool page for detailed information.
About Litecoin
On October 7, 2011, Charlie Lee released new cryptocurrency via open-source client on GitHub and 6 days later, the Litecoin network was launched. That’s the first project, which used the Scrypt hashing algorithm.
The main advantages of the Litecoin compared to Bitcoin are:
- Faster generation on blocks – 2.5minutes instead of 10 minutes
- The number of maximum coins in the network is 84.000.000 LTC instead of 21.000.000 BTC
- Uses a different hashing algorithm – Scrypt instead of SHA-256
- A slightly modified GUI (graphical user interface)
In May 2017, the developers of the Litecoin project achieved great success – they completed the first transaction based on the Lighting Network – transferring 0.00000001 LTC between Zürich and San Francisco in less than one second.