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Bitcoin transaction fees have experienced a sharp decline following the record high of $128 daily average on April 20, coinciding with the fourth Bitcoin halving.
On April 21, medium-priority transactions on Bitcoin ranged from $8 to $10, according to mempool.space. This marks a significant drop from the previous day’s $78.3 million total fees, a figure that surpassed Ethereum’s by over 24 times, according to Crypto Fees.
The halving day saw Bitcoin miner ViaBTC receive 37.7 BTC ($2.4 million) in the halving block at height 840,000, making it the most lucrative block in Bitcoin’s 15-year history. The intense demand stemmed from enthusiasts of memecoins and nonfungible tokens competing to inscribe and etch rare satoshis via the new Runes protocol, launched during the halving block.
The block contained 3,050 transactions, averaging a cost of nearly $800 per user.
Data from mempool.space indicates that the elevated block fees persisted up until around block 840,200, but have since decreased to around 1–2 BTC.
These elevated fees initially cushioned the impact of the block subsidy halving from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC for miners. However, now that the average block fee is below 3.125 BTC, the effects of the halving are more pronounced.
Total fees for block 840,266 reached 1.64 BTC, leading to total rewards of 4.76 BTC with the new block subsidy of 3.125 BTC, as reported by mempool.space.
Bitcoin fees have remained higher than Ethereum for six consecutive days between April 15 and 20, with a seven-day fee average of $17.8 million.
Despite the halving event, Bitcoin’s price has remained relatively stable, rising 1.5% since the event to reach $64,840, according to CoinGecko.