Wi-Fi or Ethernet for a mining rig: what actually matters
Opinions about rig networking come in two extremes: some drag gigabit Ethernet "for speed", others mine for years on a USB dongle behind two walls and wonder about rejected shares. The truth sits in between: mining does not need speed — it needs stability and latency. Here is what actually travels over the link and how to pick one without overpaying and without losses.
The short version (for the no-time-to-read)
- Mining runs on kilobytes per second. "Fast internet" barely affects revenue — latency and packet loss do.
- Ethernet is the default choice. Cheap, predictable, immune to the neighbors' routers and the microwave.
- Wi-Fi is fine with a good signal and a decent adapter. A bargain USB dongle is a lottery of midnight drop-offs.
- Pool latency matters more than speed: high delay = stale shares = work done for nothing. Pick the pool's nearest server.
- A backup link pays for itself on the first outage. A second provider or an LTE router is insurance on your revenue, not a luxury.
What actually travels over the link
A rig talks to the pool in short messages: it receives a job and sends back solutions (shares). That is a few kilobytes per second; by traffic volume, mining is comparable to a chat app. So a gigabit plan for a rig is overpaying — while three characteristics decide everything:
- latency (ping) to the pool server. A share that arrives after the job has changed counts as stale or does not count at all. Tens of milliseconds is great; hundreds are losses;
- packet loss. Even rare loss turns into rejected shares. A percent of rejected shares is a straight percent off your revenue;
- stability. A link that vanishes for a minute every hour costs more than it seems: reconnects, miner restarts, gaps in the stats.
How this connects to the money at the end — in the article on pools and payouts.
Ethernet, Wi-Fi, USB dongles and powerline
- Ethernet cable — the benchmark: predictable latency, zero loss, independent of the radio spectrum. If you can run a cable to the rig — run it, question closed forever.
- Wi-Fi with a good signal — a working option: the built-in module or a decent adapter, the router in the same room or one wall away, a 5 GHz network clear of the neighbors'. Easy to verify: ping the router for a day with zero loss.
- Cheap USB adapters — the top source of "the rig just dropped by itself" mysteries: overheating, port power sag, driver drop-offs. If you need Wi-Fi, get an adapter with an external antenna, or put a router in repeater mode with a cable into the rig.
- Powerline (network over outlets) — a lottery that depends on your wiring. Usually bad in older buildings; if you are considering it, test before building the farm, not after.
Setup and backup
- Pick the pool's nearest server. Big pools run servers on several continents; the latency difference is tens of milliseconds, and it goes straight into your stale-share rate.
- Watch the rejected-share stats in the miner, not just the hashrate. It is the most honest indicator of link health.
- A backup link. An LTE router as standby internet costs pennies next to a rig and rarely kicks in — but it is what decides whether a provider's night outage means an hour of downtime or none.
- The LAN is part of the network too. Monitoring and control travel over your own network: a router on a UPS (we covered that in the UPS article) means that when the lights flicker, you at least see what is happening.
Where automation fits
A network dies in different ways: the pool unreachable, shares rejected, the rig alive but silent. OCBot tracks what the rig is actually mining, not just whether it is powered, and sends reports to Telegram — while any channel is alive, you stay informed. And a rig going completely silent in the bot is a signal in itself: check the network and power first.
This article is general information summarizing public practice; actual numbers depend on your provider and pool. OCBot is an independent project: not affiliated with NVIDIA, HiveOS or Hiveon. Use at your own risk — see the disclaimer.