Riot Platforms vs. CleanSpark: Comparing the Miners

Riot Platforms and CleanSpark are two of the largest listed bitcoin miners in the US. Riot relies on a few huge sites in Texas and also earns money from power it does not use. CleanSpark is spread across many smaller sites, mainly in the south-east of the US, and keeps most of the bitcoin it mines. According to their latest reports (as of 30.09.2026), CleanSpark holds 13’530 BTC, Riot only 2’418 BTC.

Two miners, two business models

A miner sells computing power to the Bitcoin network and receives new bitcoin and fees in return. How that works technically is explained in Bitcoin mining explained. This article is about two companies that do it on an industrial scale, and about what sets them apart.

Riot Platforms (Nasdaq: RIOT) used to be called Bioptix and was a biotech company. In 2017 it became Riot Blockchain, in 2023 Riot Platforms. The company runs a few very large sites. The best known is in Rockdale, Texas, on the grounds of a former Alcoa aluminium plant. A second large site is Corsicana, also in Texas. On top of that come sites in Kentucky.

CleanSpark (Nasdaq: CLSK) comes from energy technology and built software for microgrids. At the end of 2020 it entered mining by buying a data centre in Georgia, and later gave up its energy business. Today CleanSpark mines at many sites, among them in Georgia, Tennessee, Mississippi and Wyoming. According to its operational update for September 2026, it has more than 1.8 gigawatts of contracted power.

The larger competitor MARA takes a third path with its own energy assets and a large bitcoin holding. It is covered in Marathon Digital: The largest listed bitcoin miner.

Sites and power strategy

Power is a miner's largest running cost. Whoever pays one cent less per kilowatt hour survives the bad years in which others shut down. Riot and CleanSpark solve this differently.

Riot: Texas and power credits

Texas has its own power grid, run by ERCOT. Wholesale prices there swing strongly. On hot summer days, power can briefly cost many times the usual price.

Riot uses this in two ways:

• Fixed-price contracts with resale. In Rockdale, Riot bought power long term at a fixed price. When the market price rises sharply, Riot switches off its miners and sells the unused power back. Riot books this as "power credits".
• Demand response programmes. Riot commits to ERCOT to shut down quickly during grid stress. In return it receives credits for being on standby, even when it does not have to shut down.

August 2023 showed how much this can be worth: in that single month Riot received about 31.7 million US dollars in credits and mined fewer bitcoin than usual. More on this part of the energy debate is in Bitcoin and energy.

For you as a reader of Riot's reports, this means: Riot often states its costs "net of power credits". That is legitimate, but it mixes two businesses. Part of the profit comes from trading power, not from mining.

CleanSpark: many sites, regulated grids

CleanSpark spreads its capacity across many sites in several states. Most are connected to regulated grids with comparatively calm tariffs, for example in Georgia and in the Tennessee Valley Authority's area. The price spikes of Texas don't apply, but neither does the chance of large credits.

CleanSpark has grown largely through acquisitions: it took over existing mining sites from other operators and expanded them with new machines. That brings capacity online quickly, but every site has its own contracts, its own prices and its own risks.

Self-mining: keep or sell

Both companies mine for their own account. They don't rent their computing power to third parties but receive the reward directly through a mining pool. What differs is what happens to the bitcoin afterwards.

For comparison: MARA held 34’012 BTC on the same date, but also sold a large part in 2026. Current figures for all three are on the pages for Riot Platforms, CleanSpark and MARA Holdings in our treasury overview.

A miner that keeps its bitcoin is a double bet on the price: if bitcoin rises, both income and holdings rise. If it falls, both shrink. A miner that sells uses the proceeds to pay for power, machines and expansion without issuing new shares or debt. Since its record high in October 2025, bitcoin has lost about 40 %. In a phase like this, even miners that used to hold everything sell.

Our data file has no share count for CleanSpark. You can calculate its holdings per share the same way, using the share count from the latest quarterly report. How to compare holdings per share over time is shown in Calculating a company's BTC yield.

The turn to AI and high-performance computing

Since the halving in April 2024, a block brings only 3.125 new bitcoin. At the same time, AI companies urgently need data centres with large power connections. Miners have exactly that.

Both companies are responding. Riot is converting part of its capacity into data centres. CleanSpark is building data centres for AI and high-performance computing. The logic behind it:

• Predictable income. A lease with an AI customer brings fixed payments for years. Mining income swings with price and difficulty.
• Higher income per megawatt. AI data centres are considered more lucrative per megawatt than mining, but they also cost much more per megawatt to build.
• A different risk. The build-out needs a lot of capital, customers with long contracts and different know-how than mining.

For bitcoin investors, this changes the stock. A miner that leases half its capacity to AI customers is no longer a pure lever on bitcoin. Whether that is good depends on what you are looking for. If you want bitcoin, buy bitcoin directly. If you want a data centre business with a bitcoin component, you will find it here.

The five metrics for the comparison

Miner reports are full of figures. Five of them are enough to compare two miners fairly. Always take them from reports for the same quarter, otherwise you are comparing different points in time.

Hashrate and share of the network

Hashrate says how many attempts per second a miner's machines manage. More important than the absolute figure is the share of the whole network. If the network grows faster than the miner, it mines fewer bitcoin despite new machines. This is governed by the difficulty adjustment every 2’016 blocks.

Efficiency in joules per terahash

J/TH says how much power a machine needs for a trillion attempts. A miner with older machines pays more for power for the same share of the network. Efficiency therefore shows how well a miner survives a halving or a price crash.

Cost per bitcoin

The most important figure, and the easiest to dress up. Some reports state only power costs, others all operating costs, others deduct credits. Depreciation of machines is often missing entirely, even though machines become outdated after a few years.

Try the same with your own figures in the mining calculator. It also shows up to which power price a machine pays off:

Bitcoin holdings and debt belong together

Large bitcoin holdings look solid. But if debt stands against them, they belong to the shareholders only in part. In recent years both companies have financed themselves through new shares, convertible notes or loans as well. How high the debt currently is and when it falls due is in each quarterly report filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Check in particular whether bitcoin is pledged as collateral. If the price falls sharply, the lender can demand more collateral, and the miner has to sell at the worst moment. What this means for companies holding bitcoin on credit is explained in The risk of leveraged bitcoin companies.

Riot or CleanSpark: the comparison at a glance

This table doesn't say which stock is better. It shows which questions to ask. Riot is more of an energy and site company whose bitcoin holdings have become small. CleanSpark is closer to a miner that holds bitcoin as a reserve. With every AI contract, both become less of a pure bitcoin investment.