There are about 120.2 million Ethereum coins in circulation at the time of writing. The supply of Ethereum has been changing quite a bit over the years, as it initially displayed consistent growth, but entered a slightly deflationary trend in September of 2022 after Ethereum transitioned to Proof-of-Stake with The Merge upgrade.
In this article, we’ll explain the Ethereum supply and how it is expected to change over time. When it comes to cryptocurrencies, supply dynamics are very important and can have a massive impact on long-term price movements.
Ethereum supply explained
When talking about Ethereum’s tokenomics, it’s important to understand that there is no upper limit to the amount of ETH that can exist. Therefore, the max supply of Ethereum is technically infinite. This is different from a cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin, where the protocol has a clearly defined limit of how many coins can exist (21 million BTC in the example of Bitcoin)
However, Ethereum having a theoretically unlimited maximum supply doesn’t mean that you should be concerned about massive inflation in the Ethereum supply. In fact, the supply of ETH has been gradually decreasing for about a year now.
As we can see on the Ethereum supply chart, the Ethereum supply was growing between launch and September of 2022, although the rate at which new coins were being issued was gradually decreasing. For example, in June 2016, around 30,000 ETH was entering circulation through block rewards on a daily basis. By June 2022, three months before The Merge, only around 13,000 ETH was entering circulation each day.
On the chart, we can clearly see that the ETH supply growth peaked in September of 2022, when Ethereum adopted its new Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism.
Growth of the ETH supply from July 2015 to August 2023. Image source: Etherscan
Another important aspect of the Ethereum supply to understand is that each ETH coin can be broken down into a very large amount of smaller units. The smallest unit of ETH is called wei, named after Chinese computer engineer and cryptography expert Wei Dai.
Wei is similar to Bitcoin’s smallest denomination, satoshi. Each ETH coin can be broken down into 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 (one quintillion) wei. Here’s what the different denominations are called:
| Name | Number of wei |
|---|---|
| wei | 1 |
| kwei | 1,000 |
| mwei | 1,000,000 |
| gwei | 1,000,000,000 |
| twei | 1,000,000,000,000 |
| pwei | 1,000,000,000,000,000 |
| Ether | 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 |
The move to Proof-of-Stake (PoS) has had a big impact on the Ethereum supply
After the transition to Proof-of-Stake, the Ethereum protocol needs to issue much fewer ETH coins to ensure that the network is secure — simply put, staking is a much less resource-intensive process than mining.
Before the move to Proof-of-Stake in September of 2022, around 13,000 ETH was being issued per day to provide incentives to Ethereum miners. Meanwhile, the new Proof-of-Stake system only has to issue about 1,600 ETH to adequately incentivize stakers and ensure that the network remains secure. After the transition to PoS, there has been about an 87.7% drop in the amount of new ETH coins that enter circulation each day.
There is another crucial aspect to Ethereum’s supply dynamics called EIP-1559. EIP-1559 is an upgrade that was activated on the Ethereum network in August of 2021. The upgrade reworked Ethereum’s transaction fee market. After EIP-1559, the base ETH transaction fee paid for each transaction is burned (removed from circulation forever), while users retain the option to include tips to validators in order to have their transactions prioritized.
Essentially, EIP-1559 means that the more demand there is for transactions on the Ethereum network, the more ETH is being burned. Since the move to Proof-of-Stake, enough ETH has been burned through EIP-1559 to reduce the overall supply of ETH, even though about 1,600 ETH are being created each day.
The combination of factors that is contributing to the reduction of the ETH supply is often called the Ethereum triple halving.
Based on trends since The Merge, 674,000 ETH will be issued in the next year, while 996,000 ETH will be burned. This would mean a 322,000 ETH reduction in the Ethereum supply.
Estimated yearly ETH issuance and burn based on trend since The Merge. Image source: ultrasound.money
If you want to track detailed information about the ETH supply, we recommend you check out the platform ultrasound.money. It offers an Ethereum supply chart, tracks trends in changes to the ETH supply, and provides real-time tracking of how much ETH is being burned throughEIP-1559.
The bottom line
We can expect the supply of Ethereum to continue decreasing gradually, provided that demand for Ethereum transactions remains high. Since Ethereum is easily the largest blockchain platform for smart contracts and decentralized applications, it’s pretty safe to assume that the majority of users looking to engage in DeFi, stablecoins, NFTs, blockchain gaming and other use cases will continue to have Ethereum as their first option.
If you want to learn more about Ethereum, make sure to check out our article exploring if Ethereum is a good investment or not.
Ethereum supply FAQs
How many Ethereum are there?
Currently, there are about 120.2 million Ethereum coins in circulation. However, we can expect the amount of Ethereum to gradually decrease over time due to the EIP-1559 burn mechanism.
Is there a max supply of Ethereum?
No, there is no max supply of Ethereum. Theoretically, an infinite amount of ETH could exist, but only a limited of ETH is issued each day and ETH coins are also constantly being burned through EIP-1559.
How much Ethereum is left?
Since there is no maximum supply of ETH, the Ethereum protocol will never run out of new ETH coins to create.
How many Ethereum are destroyed?
Based on current trends, around 996,000 Ethereum coins are destroyed each year through the EIP-1559 burn mechanism.
Who has the most ETH in the world?
Currently, the most ETH is held by the Beacon Deposit Contract, which holds more than 29 million ETH (over $50 billion).
