5 worst ASIC miners to buy in 2026 (and what to buy instead)

Short answer: the five worst ASIC miners to buy in 2026 are:

1. The Antminer S19 / S19j Pro family, with the S9 and WhatsMiner M30S
2. First-generation Kaspa miners such as the Antminer KS3
3. Goldshell AL-BOX Alephium miners
4. First-generation Aleo miners such as the Goldshell AE-BOX
5. Ethash leftovers like the Antminer E9 Pro and iPollo V1

Every one of them breaks even only below about $0.045/kWh, and most below $0.02/kWh. That is cheaper than even the cheapest government mining tariffs in the world, so they lose money almost anywhere a normal buyer can plug them in.

None of these were bad machines when they launched. Newer hardware, collapsing coin prices or protocol changes have since made the maths stop working. They are still widely listed, often at prices that look like bargains. All figures are at network revenue on 9 November 2026: Bitcoin hashprice $31.62 per PH/day (Hashrate Index); altcoin rates from WhatToMine, Kryptex and CoinGecko.

The quick rule

A miner's break-even power price is its daily revenue divided by the kWh it burns per day. For reference:

• Paraguay's crypto tariff is about $0.044/kWh, and Ethiopia's is 4–6.5 US cents.
• The EU household average is about €0.28/kWh.
• A current Antminer S21 (200T) breaks even at about $0.075/kWh.

Anything breaking even under $0.045/kWh is a bad buy for almost everyone.

*Gross, before Aleo's staking requirement, so real returns are lower. Revenue at 100% uptime, before pool fees.

1. Antminer S19 / S19j Pro (and S9, WhatsMiner M30S)

Why people buy it: it is the cheapest "real" Bitcoin miner on every resale site, with S19j Pro units listed around $390–450.

Why it's a bad buy:

• At 29.5 J/TH it earns about $3.29 a day but uses 73.6 kWh. It loses about $4 a day at $0.10/kWh, and its power bill takes more than half its revenue even at a $0.04 hosting rate.
• The S9 (about 98 J/TH, break-even $0.013) and M30S (break-even $0.035) are worse.
• Reliability: in 2023 Compass Mining reported design issues in later S19-series batches that could cause overheating and failures. Repair shops list fans, PIC communication errors and hashboard dropouts as the most common S19 faults.

Buy instead: a new Antminer S21 200T at $735. It is about 70% more efficient per watt and breaks even at $0.075/kWh.

2. Antminer KS3 and other first-generation Kaspa miners

Why people buy it: used KS3s sell for about $400–450. It was the Kaspa machine to own in 2023.

Why it's a bad buy:

• Kaspa (KAS) is about 86% below its July 2024 high.
• Each new ASIC generation multiplied network hashrate. The current Antminer KS7 is about 4.4× more efficient than a KS3.
• A KS3 earns about $1.42 a day on 77 kWh, a break-even of $0.019/kWh. At $0.10 it loses roughly $2,270 a year, about five times its resale price.
• The same applies to the IceRiver KS0/KS3 and Goldshell KA-BOX.
• These are Kaspa-only machines with no other algorithm to fall back on.

Buy instead: the Antminer KS7 40T (break-even about $0.077), and only if you accept that Kaspa's block reward keeps falling every month.

3. Goldshell AL-BOX range (Alephium)

Why people buy it: small, quiet "box" miners marketed to home beginners.

Why it's a bad buy:

• Alephium (ALPH) is about 99% below its February 2024 high.
• An AL-BOX III earns about $0.22 a day, a break-even of about $0.015/kWh.
• Even the newest, larger Alephium machines break even at only about $0.03.
• They are single-algorithm, so they can't be switched to another coin.

Buy instead: nothing on Blake3 today. For a quiet home unit, look at the Avalon Q or Fluminer T3.

4. Goldshell AE-BOX / AE Max (first-generation Aleo)

The cleanest example of launch hype meeting reality:

• When the AE-BOX Pro launched in February 2025 at $2,999, calculators showed about $28 a day.
• Today it earns about $0.15 a day, gross.
• ALEO is 99.5% below its September 2024 peak.
• Since 1 August 2025, Aleo's ARC-46 upgrade requires miners to stake ALEO for their work to count. The required stake rises every quarter, so hashrate without stake earns even less.
• The AE-BOX Pro, E-AE1M and AE Max all break even at $0.013–0.016/kWh before staking.

Buy instead: avoid Aleo mining unless you understand and accept the staking model.

5. Antminer E9 Pro and iPollo V1 (Ethash leftovers)

Why they exist: they were built for Ethereum, which stopped proof-of-work mining at the Merge on 15 September 2022. They now mine Ethereum Classic, which is 96% below its 2021 high, and small forks.

Why they're bad buys:

• Break-even: E9 Pro $0.025/kWh, iPollo V1 $0.017/kWh.
• Newer Etchash machines like the iPollo V2 are 3–5× more efficient.

Buy instead: if you want ETC exposure, a current-generation Etchash machine. Most buyers are better off with a Bitcoin or Scrypt miner.

Dishonourable mentions

• Antminer L7: still sold new at $1,149+, but the Antminer L9 is about twice as efficient (break-even $0.077 vs $0.045).
• Kadena miners (KA3, KD-BOX): the Kadena organisation shut down in October 2025, KDA fell about 60% in a day, and exchanges and pools delisted it.
• "Win 3.125 BTC" USB and mini miners: a 1.2 TH Bitaxe has about a 1-in-16,800 chance of a block per year; a 55 kH/s NerdMiner, roughly 1 in hundreds of billions. Fine as a hobby or tiny heater, but never an income device.

Is it a scam? Red flags when buying any miner

• A price far below the going rate on ASIC Miner Value or Hashrate Index.
• Crypto or bank-wire payment only, with no card or escrow.
• "Limited pre-order" pressure.
• A new or misspelled domain imitating a manufacturer. Bitmain states that bitmain.com is its only official site.
• No VAT number or company registration for an EU seller.
• "Guaranteed daily returns" bundled with hosting.

More detail: how to spot fake ASIC miner shops.

A note on our own catalogue

We still list some machines in the same classes as this list. They include:

• Goldshell Alephium and Aleo units
• the iPollo V1
• older-generation WhatsMiners such as the M33S++ and M50
• older Kaspa units like the Goldshell E-KA1M and iBeLink BM-KS Max

They only make sense for buyers with power under about $0.02–0.04/kWh. We don't recommend them to anyone else, and the numbers above apply to them exactly as they do to anyone else's stock. Before you buy any machine from us or anywhere else, check its break-even on our profitability ranking.

What to buy instead

See What ASIC miner should I buy in 2026? for a step-by-step guide, or the 5 best Bitcoin miners under $1,000 if budget is the constraint.

Figures as of 9 November 2026 and change daily. Break-even assumes 100% uptime and no pool fees. Coin price changes are measured against each coin's all-time high (CoinGecko).