Nobody can mint new bitcoin on request. New BTC enters circulation only through mining, as the block reward. When people talk about "Bitcoin minting" today they usually mean creating Ordinals inscriptions, BRC-20 tokens or Runes on the Bitcoin blockchain, or minting a wrapped version of BTC on another chain. Each is a different process with different risks.
Four things "minting" can mean
| Term | What happens | Who can do it |
|---|---|---|
| Mining new BTC | A miner finds a valid block and claims the block subsidy plus fees in the coinbase transaction | Miners, competing with the whole network's hashrate |
| Inscribing an Ordinal | Data (an image, text, code) is written into a transaction's witness and associated with a specific satoshi | Anyone with a Taproot-capable wallet and fees |
| Minting a BRC-20 or Rune | A fungible token is deployed and minted according to a protocol that indexers interpret | Anyone, subject to the token's mint terms |
| Minting wrapped BTC | BTC is locked with a custodian or bridge and an equivalent token is issued on another chain | Approved merchants or bridge users |
Mining: the only way new bitcoin is created
The Bitcoin protocol releases new coins on a fixed schedule. Each block's subsidy halves roughly every four years; after the April 2024 halving it is 3.125 BTC per block. Total supply is capped just under 21 million. A miner earns BTC only by contributing proof of work and having a block accepted. The Bitcoin mining guide covers hardware, pools and the economics.
Ordinals inscriptions
The Ordinals protocol, launched in early 2023 by Casey Rodarmor, assigns serial numbers to individual satoshis and lets users attach content to them through inscriptions. It relies on two earlier upgrades: SegWit, which discounts witness data, and Taproot (2021), which relaxed limits on script size. An inscription is made with a two-step commit and reveal transaction pair; the content sits in the reveal transaction's witness.
Key points for anyone minting or running a minting service:
- Bitcoin nodes do not know about Ordinals. Ownership is tracked by off-chain indexers (the reference
ordclient) following the protocol's rules. Wallets must avoid spending inscribed satoshis as ordinary fees. - Fees scale with content size and the fee market. Large images can be expensive when blocks are full.
- Collections are usually inscribed by a creator and then distributed, or minted by the public through a launchpad that builds transactions on their behalf.
If you are building a venue for trading these, see the Ordinals marketplace guide, which covers PSBT-based listings.
Fungible tokens on Bitcoin: BRC-20 and Runes
BRC-20, created in March 2023, uses JSON inscriptions to deploy, mint and transfer tokens. It is simple but inefficient: every action is an inscription, and balances exist only in indexers.
Runes, also designed by Casey Rodarmor, launched at the April 2024 halving block. It stores token data in an OP_RETURN output and fits Bitcoin's UTXO model, which means fewer junk outputs and cheaper transfers. A Rune is "etched" with its name, divisibility, supply and optional open-mint terms (caps, block-height windows); anyone can then mint within those terms.
Both rely on indexers agreeing on the rules. A bug or disagreement between indexers can show different balances in different wallets, which is a real operational risk for exchanges and marketplaces.
Wrapped bitcoin
To use BTC in Ethereum or Solana DeFi, holders mint a wrapped token such as WBTC or cbBTC. A custodian holds the real BTC and mints an equivalent token on the other chain; burning the token redeems the BTC. The risk shifts from Bitcoin's security to the custodian or bridge. Trust-minimized alternatives use threshold signatures or Bitcoin-native verification, each with its own assumptions.
How minting services work, and how to vet one
Inscription and Rune launchpads take your file or token parameters, build commit and reveal transactions, and either have you sign them in your wallet or ask you to pay into a temporary address they control. Before using one:
- Prefer services where you sign in your own wallet via PSBTs, rather than sending funds to a service address.
- Check the fee breakdown: network fee, postage (the sats held in the inscription output), and the service fee.
- Use an Ordinals-aware wallet so inscribed sats are not accidentally spent.
- Verify the result on an independent explorer that runs its own indexer.
Teams building their own minting flow should look at the NFT minting platform guide for front-end and queueing patterns that also apply here.
Frequently asked questions
Can I mint my own bitcoin?
No. Only miners create new BTC, through proof of work, at a rate fixed by the protocol. You can create tokens or inscriptions on Bitcoin, but they are not bitcoin.
What is the difference between Ordinals and Runes?
Ordinals inscriptions attach arbitrary data to individual satoshis, mostly for unique items. Runes is a protocol for fungible tokens that stores data in OP_RETURN outputs and fits the UTXO model more efficiently.
Are Ordinals NFTs?
They work like NFTs in practice: unique, transferable items. The content is stored on-chain in Bitcoin transaction data rather than referenced by a URL, which differs from many Ethereum NFTs.
Why are inscription fees so variable?
They depend on content size and Bitcoin's fee market. When many people transact or inscribe at once, the fee per virtual byte rises sharply.