# Mining cost per ZEC

**URL:** <https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-cost-per-zec/14441>\
**Category:** Mining\
**Created:** [February 26, 2017, 1:48am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-cost-per-zec/14441 "2017-02-26T01:48:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![hao777](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a4c791/32.png) [@hao777](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/hao777)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2017, 1:48am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-cost-per-zec/14441/1 "2017-02-26T01:48:34Z")

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How much it cost to mine one ZEC ? Is it profitable ?  
I’m thinking to buy some cards and start to mine ZEC, not sure when can I get positive return on investment.

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**Author:** ![CryptoYeti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e68b1a/32.png) [@CryptoYeti](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/CryptoYeti)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2017, 2:36am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-cost-per-zec/14441/2 "2017-02-26T02:36:10Z")

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It depends on many factors, with the main one being your power costs. Right now with a typical 6 GPU setup it will cost you around $8-$10 in power cost to mine 1 ZEC. You will also have ROI to concern yourself with and with ZEC currently trading at under $20 and taking roughly 5 days to earn 1 ZEC with the above example rig, it would take over a year of mining at the current rates to ROI on your investment.

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**Author:** ![CryptoYeti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e68b1a/32.png) [@CryptoYeti](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/CryptoYeti)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2017, 6:31am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-cost-per-zec/14441/3 "2017-02-26T06:31:55Z")

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I should have added that if you are indeed still considering this, you could mine a more profitable coin such as Ethereum and get almost double the amount of income (in dollar terms) in the same time-span. If you want ZEC you could basically sell the ETH you mine and buy ZEC at an almost 1.5 to 2x ratio. With current conditions you would be still be looking at a 9 to 11 month ROI period, but it is an option.