Topic: what happens to bitcoin if the electricity and internet goes out.? (Read 645 times)

If there is no electricity in the world then how our life will be can be easily guessed. Assuming there is no electricity in the world, then you can easily think that vehicles, factories and various institutions that depend on electricity will be shut down. If all these factories are closed then our life will be disrupted.  Let's come to the main point in particular, our primitive civilization where there was no electricity i.e. before the invention of electricity people lived like nomads, they had no fixed address, they had to depend on hunting for food, they had no clothing, they were completely victims of the natural environment.  , their life span was very short, so without electricity our life system would be like Adam civilization. Just like the primitive man did not have a coin like Bitcoin, our Bitcoin will not exist.  This is because the use of electricity is undeniable if you want to run Bitcoin, if you want to make a transaction, you will need a computer and a mobile phone.  If there is no electricity, the computer mobile will not work.  So to think of Bitcoin apart from our electricity is absolutely foolish.

Even though you may have heard that Bitcoin transactions may be created offline, they actually still require the internet for the last step in order to be executed and recorded on the blockchain. If the internet and electricity go out, no one will be able to trade Bitcoin any longer, and I predict that the price will fall since it would be rendered useless. But since so many renewable energies may be employed to generate electricity and an internet connection, it is essentially impossible for electricity and the internet to go out in this planet.

If the electricity and internet goes out per say, although highly unlikely, bitcoin mining and other of its processing parts that make it function might have to also shutdown till it is restored. I dont have doubt that it might impact the exchange rates of the moment, because the world will have to be at a standstill. The stock market would crash and almost all businesses may have to shutdown.

The topic gets so interesting because the thoughts of what might happen far out weighs what might not happen and this is scary.

It wouldn't crash because there is no selling or buying pressure, so it will immediately stop at that price. But agree, electricity and the internet are impossible unless there is world war 3 when all infrastructure is damaged, and only the military can access the internet. The problem is that if the internet is back, what will happen to the price, is the whales will kick in ? since only a few are selling or buying pressure. I don't want to overthink, but this topic seems interesting to me now; I will have more research about this.

Bitcoin is a decentralized cryptocurrency that works on various blockchain nodes. As long as there is one blockchain node accessible through the network, Bitcoin will survive, in other words blockchain based currencies require large amounts of electricity.
If the electricity and internet in this world goes out then no one has access to the internet. Even if there is no longer access to the internet Bitcoin will still exist like all other data. In theory how would you buy or sell Bitcoin offline.? Bitcoin is basically a digital currency, its basic value is determined by online supply and demand because most digital goods and services depend on a connection to the internet.

The above question (Op) is just like you fly to another planet with $10 million, of course you can't spend it because it's not the default currency there.

If the world remains without electricity (and I don't even want to assume what should happen for this to happen), then the absence of the Internet and the naturally disappeared Bitcoin will worry humanity very little. It will literally be the fall of civilization, a return to the Middle Ages. And scattered groups of adventurers in Mad Max style will build their well-being on completely other things.

The survival conditions would become extremely difficult because the business would shut down and the economy would disturb and there will be revolts and loots as you say and bitcoin won't help in that manner because you would not to be able to make btc payments at all and the best will be how to survive that tough situations.But with internet and electricity going off this is not happening as we all know it would cost billion of dollars loss in seconds and government won't let it happen.

When this happens, not only Bitcoin cannot run but also all systems in this world that are using electricity and the Internet will not be able to turn. But, it doesn't mean that you lost your BItcoin. You cannot access it. If someday the electricity and internet connection are on again, you can then gain access again. This will also happen to all around the world that are using them. And if there is no electricity and internet again in this world ever after, this means there is doomsday happens

The imagine a good answer to the question of what happen to bitcoin when electricity or the internet golly off, first one needs to know that Bitcoin doesn't and can't exist without the internet and that is why Bitcoin is referred to as the internet money since all it operations are done on the internet.
But we must also know that not only Bitcoin will be shutdown without the internet, all other essential services will also be shut down along side such as financial sector health sector and others that requires power and the internet to operate.

Imagine the scenario just remove the bitcoin from it what do you think? The whole world will be in Chaos and without internet banking system will also be broken even if they manage to get power with generator still without internet there will be no transaction and the essential items like food, gas, oil will become the currency.

It's funny how people worry about how they are going to transact bitcoin in case of a worldwide electricity and internet outage. Worry about having enough ammunition for your shotgun before the looting starts. The world will come to a halt, and your main concerns will be finding enough food and clean drinking water so you and your family don't starve. If such conditions were to last, many wouldn't make it simply because we aren't used to it.     

If it happens the internet, bitcoin and bank won't be much problem to Man. The level at which technology has gone if electricity and the Internet seize I bet you many lives will be lost because it will affect the health sectors and operation of aircrafts.  Monetary transactions can even be the last thing people will think of at that time, people will think how to survive first.

The bitcoin transactions are settled over the internet and recorded in blockchain and all this happens with the internet connectivity as it need to be visible to all the nodes to verify it so without internet it would not be functional in the real sense.Speaking of electricity then mining process requires electricity to mine new bitcoins so it would be problematic in its absence but not only btc but the world business will also shut down in many aspects as all of them are running with internet and electricity so it will not happen so btc don't have any such problems faced.

Aren't Amish people doing the same (by choice)? They live in United States and Canada and swear off technology that includes using electricity and fossil fuels, and live in their own "cities" away from everything modern.

If the electricity and internet were to go out, we would have more problems than just a bitcoin affect, with electricity being the key.  If correct, bitcoin can run over RF and ham radio if needed.

I'm sure you've got good answers from others but I'll try to answer your question too. Bitcoin is not a physical coin, it takes the internet and electricity to be able to make transactions with it, without electricity and the internet we will not be able to transact with Bitcoin.

We are now in a world of green energy, if I can run my BTC node on solar energy then I can still make transaction for myself, the halt will not be worldwide, only those how have no electricity will be affected, correct me if I am wrong with this idea.

You don't have to use fossil fuel directly by yourself to still need it. Most food wouldn't be produced without fossil fuel, the device you're using to post this needed fossil fuel to be produced, and even if you're using solar panels to power it, those panels were produced using fossil fuel.

My dearest Loyce it might surprise you to know that there are part of Africa, Who have never see electricity, nor use the Fossils Fuel in their entire lives and till date they have no idea what it means putting on a Generator, those part of African be can located in part of Madagascar, Tanzania, Part of Nigerians, and few other places, it might amazed you to know that even where I comes from in Nigeria, I once stayed for 3 years without electricity, Neither do we have Fuel for Generator, but the community did so well, to create a Local Battery 🔋 hubs, Mix together for Charging mobiles phone. So it's deeper than you might think. During my days of touring those African countries, I saw hell on the surface of the earth.

That's the thing: I wasn't prepared for it. When I am for instance camping, I'm totally fine without electricity for days. If you live in a cabin in the woods, you can be okay forever without electricity. But if you're in a place where everything is electric, an unexpect outage basically shuts down everything.

That's not true. Nuclear grids can be shut down (but the plant needs backup power for cooling). If you're a user on a nuclear grid, obviously they can shut you down.

That's literally how a blockchain works.
A much more interesting scenario is what happens with a transatlantic internet outage: let's say Bitcoin miners can no longer connect to all other miners, and the miners are divided into 3 different "local" pools for a couple of hours. Once connections are restored, they'll switch to the longest chain, and 2 out of 3 continents will see their blocks reorganized.

will this take us to the stone age?
we know that now we with the simplest life also use electricity and the Internet. didn't think the world would return to such a decline.
and if this imagination happens, Bitcoin, even fiat banking will not operate. We're back to bartering finance. where we will exchange the assets we have to get our needs.

Nuclear power grids cannot be shut down. Therefore the probability that the electricity grid will shut down is zero. Nevertheless, if this were to occur, hypothetically, I know that banks are required to back up every stock transaction. For crypto, I would assume the same is true. Reality, however, is stranger than fiction. However, is it possible for paper bills to "hold" crypto? The same as gold certificates?

There are ways to generate electricity such as using generator where you only need gasoline to keep the generator on. The question that we should answer is what will happen to cryptocurrency if the Internet goes out?. The answer to that is obvious which is that every block that will be mined sooner or later won't get mined since miners need internet so that the mining rig will work. If that happen then all transactions will stop and if all transactions will stop which means sending or receiving Bitcoin is not possible or won't happen. Do you think there will be new transactions?. I don't think there will be new transactions where miners include it in their pool until the transactionw are confirmed. I will make it short, Can you search any random videos on YouTube without Internet?. The answer to this questy will be the same as what will happen to Bitcoin if internet goes out.

What makes you think in such way right now since we haven't had the web got shutdown or other banking transaction shut down since as a result of electricity and internet going off, therefore if those things are still working perfectly since they started operation and internet or Electricity hasn't been shut down yet, I see no reason to panic or talk about what happens to Bitcoin should internet or Electricity gets shut down.

Yeah, because that's what every human aspires at, leaving in fear, in poverty, with the constant fear of his firstborn being one of those 60 dead in a thousand, a 30x death rate for infants compared to other countries, a lack of basic needs and a constant fear of not having enough food next day and now way to store some food in advance because, well, again, poverty and basic utilities lacking.

For centuries the human race has gone without electricity, do you think that's where we should go back?
Did you go without electricity? My family went through two world wars, concentration camps, and re-education camps, wanna test those and see? Or you would just like to have the normal standards of life like everyone else instead of bragging about how you can go without food and how stupid are those people who have enough in their fridge for a month?

This stupid thing of I'm tough, I don't need that, those pussies in the western world who can't do that or that with a stick and a stone and a banana peel really needs to stop.  Rather than congratulating yourself that you can't live the way you do maybe it's about time to think of improving yourself.

Oh, and btw, where did you get that Batman quote from?
Of from a western movie, made with electricity, distributed to your country with electricity and you've watched it with the help of electricity! So much for that darkness of yours!


And how would those satellites get the data from the people on the ground?
Because I'm pretty sure you know your phone is not able to send data into space, they use ground stations, which run on electricity also.


And without electricity and cell towers and internet how are you going to send the data from your computer or phone to those stations (assuming they still have a back-up power supply?

I think not having electricity can easily be countered by using backup power like a generator, solar energy, and other several options but not having internet is a different ball game as this means you will be locked out of your wallet with no access whatsoever which will make this experience kind of an involuntary cold wallet 
And should markets turn volatile, be it bullish/bearish you cant sell your coins and just need to watch markets run.

Yeah this was what I was thinking of. There are others thing to mind when electricity and the internet goes out. I can even imagine that just Google being shut down for an hour then a lot of web projects out there would be stalled considering how many are really dependent or finding Google really useful.

Couple of days ago, there was a heavy rain here in my country that caused power outage and heck I cannot almost be productive without the use of electricity and internet.

All of online transaction will stop and for sure it will be pause and nothing will happen to any of it since there's no transaction will happen so for sure what figure last time we see will still be the price if the electricity came back. But this is so impossible to happen so don't worry about this issue since the only thing can devalue bitcoin if all people will start to sell all of their holdings.

if that were to happen, the world would be left without electricity and the internet, how do you think other things would work? 2Banks for example? all monetary transactions are made over the Internet. at that point, money would probably no longer have any value, many things would change.
So, any loss because of holding value in bitcoin would be insignificant.

If this really happens, then we need to invest on solar panels to plug our devices. And in terms of transacting Bitcoin without internet, it’s possible through Blockstream Satellite. You might wanna Google about that though.

Satellite connection is a great alternative for cryptocurrency transactions. Like in Brazil, they have deployed a satellite Bitcoin full node.

Without Electricity or sources of power generation i can say the world is half dead literally nothing will function in the world, this includes all sectors of livelihood. Talking about internet then we can say you and i can't visit our fiat money (local currency) or bitcoin wallet or have access to transaction whenever its being needed, there would be no banking and almost all the 1st to 3rd class countries would record almost 65 percent death rate quote me right if i may be wrong.
So i can say Electricity is the getaway to internet and human lives.

A world without electricity sounds like the apocalypse to you guys but I have in that world. Constant power supply is a myth in most parts of Nigeria so much so people would get uncomfortable and suspicious if they had 24 hours of electricity. Nigerians have learnt to live without the luxury of constant power supply, reading all the comments reminds me of my favorite Bane - Batman dialogue “ Ah you think darkness is your ally? You merely adopted the dark. I was born in it, molded by it. I didn't see the light until I was already a man, by then it was nothing to me but blinding!
I think we would feel the impact of not having the internet more, the world is hooked on the internet I doubt if we will be able to survive without the internet.

Electricity is periodically turned off in my city, and even though we understand that this is just a temporary phenomenon, I see the sad faces of loved ones, and there is no need to talk about our own well-being. People are so accustomed to all the conveniences of civilization that to wake up and experience a lack of light and water is a great depression. I do not understand what to do in such situations for children who are cold, dark, and simply need to be on the move, but I communicate with people who are now experiencing this, and it hurts me very much to hear it. 
And here, in such a situation, the thought of bitcoin cannot arise when one’s own health becomes important. And if we talk about the complete absence of electricity, then many will simply lose the meaning of existence.

I spent the night (last night) without electricity. That means no heating in the house, no cooling in the freezer, no working stove, no warm water, no shower, a laptop that runs out of battery and a few phones and tablets as lights. I especially like the tablet for this: it can last a few days.
Bitcoin wasn't on my list of concerns.

Youtube has several videos if you search for "world without electricity". It's fun to watch as a thought experiment.

I'm pretty sure that without electricity, and without fossil fuel, the majority of the population wouldn't survive a year.

The question would be better be what would happen to the world if electricity and internet goes off. Bitcoin would also suffer from that, but all companies, industries and institutions will all suffer from it. It will make live very difficult. No computers or online device will work, these may lead to cause of death of many people like people that depend on both in hospital. Resulting to unemployment and other related issues that will make the present world not to be like it is but bad.

Bitcoin is a new technology that relies on electricity and the internet, no transaction would be possible without them. This would be a huge setback for it if the internet and power supply are cut off, but thankfully, such has never happened in many centuries ago. Even if a country is battling with electricity and the internet, other countries of the world would be enjoying it, and Bitcoin transactions continue.

However, in this present dispensation, only world war or alien invasion could make the whole electricity and internet connection of the world cease.

All thanks to electricity for every development in the modern society. Bitcoin is no different. It's a modern technology which requires electricity. Without that, Bitcoin will have no value or meaning as it is stored on the internet. So without electricity and internet Bitcoin will be a waste. If you want to use it as a physical transaction system then the sole purpose of BTC being what it is now will be nothing.

It's a disaster for every countries and every institutional since they're really need electricity and internet, it's not only Bitcoin that need both of those thing. Banking system and fiat money will become worthless too since the government can't control their money and they can't print new money anymore. Everyone will mostly hold gold and using barter system if they want to buy food, water or medicine.

If the whole world is cut off from the internet and shuts down for a long time, your Bitcoin (if You Have one) will remain safe with you and will remain in your personal wallet even if there is no internet and no electricity.

The short is that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will continue to function even during the collapse of society and that is why most of the experts in the industry believe that Bitcoin has found its way to survival.

You can imagine for yourself that your daily life without electricity and the internet, does not need to think what happened to Bitcoin, because in fact the scale is still small for Bitcoin compared to other things that are also run by electricity and the internet, and the possibility of it happening completely throughout the world is very small and even impossible.
If electricity and internet goes out all over the world then the main thing to do about is how to turn it back on instead of thinking What About Bitcoin because it will automatically halt.

I'm not going to echo what has already been said but how realistic is this in happening?

There are so many ways of generating electricity now that it would be quite remarkable
if they all ceased at the same time.

In this current climate of fuel shortage and "possible" power shortages we have to
remember that it's going to be temporary if it does happen, it's seasonal related
to the winter when power consumption is at its highest.

ALL power isn't going to go out for a solid 4 or 6 months.

Actually, the life as we know it now, will also be halting in case there will be no power and no internet. No more crypto and no more tete-a-tete here in this forum. Business will stop operating, people can't communicate as everything must be powered though we can be using solar instead. As to internet, there is no substitute for it as of now...not unless Elon Musk and StarLink got something on their sleeve for it. Now, the question is: What are the possible scenarios that can create the stoppage of power and the internet at the same time? Maybe nuclear war in case Putin will finally go crazy to push the button?

If electricity and internet were completely cut off, we would go back to the infancy let alone bitcoin. Everything that works today requires those two things, it's like water that is always attached to our lives, we can go without food, but not without water. Without electricity bitcoin will definitely stop working and that will be the end of bitcoin. Ang if that bad thing happens, I think we won't have time to think about bitcoin, there will be hundreds of other things to deal with.

Bitcoin should be the last thing on your mind if the electricity and the internet goes out. We would be taken far back to the Stone Age. Most utilities and services we use today are either powered by electricity or internet connection or both. So bitcoin would obviously come to a halt as with most things in use today. One would think it would be obvious enough.
Personally, I think this question is rhetorical

If the internet or electricity completely stops around the world, bitcoin will be stopped too. There's no exception! Bitcoin is highly reliant on internet even though bitcoin translations can be sent over radio frequency and by some other means. But it still needs the internet to run the nodes and to get the blockchain updated with the transaction information. Also it needs miners to authorize the transaction. Otherwise the transactions will never get confirmation.

So yes, in case of total internet and electricity cut off, bitcoin will get shut off!

If electricity and internet in the world stop, while it doesn't necessarily mean Bitcoin would also stop, more likely it will. My point is that Bitcoin isn't the priority.

Surely, some families could still enjoy most of their electric appliances at home because they could shift to solar, for example, or power generators, but things are not anymore running as usual. In a way, we're going back to basic. We won't anymore be spending hours in front of our phones, computers, and televisions.

The internet money would probably stop together with the internet. But it doesn't die, of course.

Then I won’t be able to make my coffee with coffee making machine. I will probably have to do it manually over gas burner. This would be my last reply on the forum if it stops after this.

We may not read each other considering total blackout and winter.

Oh yeah and about bitcoin, it won’t be accessible and pretty much what folks said above.

If the whole internet and electricity goes out first you have no light, no power, food spoils, hospitals can't properly operate, there is no communication between any country and any townhall, the economy will grind to a halt, millions of lives will be lost and the last problem people will have will be their coins and their order on some exchange.
Without electricity all over the world, everything goes down, and seriously, everything!

And yeah for a while as probably most data centers have back-up generators your orders wills still be there and the website will still be up but unreachable so in a frozen stance till the diesel runs out and it shut down too.


How will the price crash if nobody is able to sell it anymore? 

I don't think such thing will happen to the world electricity or internet, because that is were the life of the world economy is, which many countries will never allow such evil to happen to the world internet. If such thing happen to the world electricity or internet, I don't think transaction will be running at the moment because the phones and the laptops we are using to carry out transaction are connected to internet, which you cannot have access to your wallet without internet.  People use internet to check the price of the market to know if the bullish season has come or bearish season still on ground, likewise Banks also use internet to carry out their transaction, which will be difficult for governments to allow such thing to happen to both decentralized currency and centralized currency in the world.

If you meant literally 100% no internet and electricity, then Bitcoin would halt — as well as the banking system, the world wide web, and a lot of other things that could be far more important than Bitcoin. Bitcoin would probably be the least of your problems in such a scenario.

Bitcoin need internet in order to execute the transaction being recorded on the blockchain, even though you have heard Bitcoin transaction can be created offline, but literally still need an internet for the final step. If electricity and internet goes out, no one able to trade Bitcoin anymore and my guess the price will crash since it's turn become useless. But it's really impossible for electricity and internet will goes out in this world, there's many renewable energy can be used to create electricity and internet connection.

I'm a newbie in bitcoin, and I want to ask everyone, what happens to bitcoin if the electricity and internet in this world goes out? whether bitcoin buying and selling transactions are still running or not?