About block 972,946
Bitcoin block 972,946 was mined by AntPool on October 24, 2026 at 4:14 PM UTC, 10 min 17 s after block 972,945. That is slower than the 10-minute target; long gaps are normal, since every hash attempt is an independent draw with the same tiny chance.
It confirmed 5,285 transactions in 1.60 MB (99.8% of the 4 million weight-unit limit). The median transaction paid 1.00 sat/vB, up from 0.15 sat/vB in the block before, and all fees added up to 0.0142 BTC. With the 3.125 BTC subsidy of halving era 5, AntPool earned 3.1392 BTC for this block.
Block 972,946 is number 1,235 of 2,016 in difficulty epoch 482; 781 blocks remain until the next difficulty adjustment at block 973,727. The next halving is at block 1,050,000, 77,054 blocks after this one.
Its hash starts with 20 zeros: that is the proof of work, a number below the target that the whole network’s hashrate had to search for. AntPool found 208 blocks in the week before. Today the block has 689 confirmations, so it is settled beyond any practical doubt.