Best Zcash Mining Pools in 2025: Full Comparison

Why Your Pool Choice Matters

Most miners treat pool selection as an afterthought - pick the biggest one and move on. But pool fees, payout schemes, and uptime can meaningfully impact your annual earnings. A 1% fee difference on a Z15 Pro generating $200/month in revenue is $24/year per miner. Scale that across a 10-miner farm and you're leaving $240 on the table annually for a decision that takes five minutes to optimise.

Pool Comparison Table

Understanding Payout Schemes

The payout scheme determines how the pool divides block rewards among miners. The key options:

• PPS (Pay Per Share): You're paid a fixed amount for every valid share submitted, regardless of whether the pool finds a block. Eliminates variance - predictable daily payouts. Pools charge higher fees to cover the risk they absorb.
• PPS+ (PPS Plus): Combines PPS for block rewards with PPLNS for transaction fees. Offers stable base pay plus a share of transaction fees. F2Pool uses this model.
• PPLNS (Pay Per Last N Shares): Only pays when the pool finds a block, divided among miners who contributed shares in the recent window. Slightly more variance than PPS but often better expected value over time. Lower fees since the pool shares risk.
• SOLO: You mine independently through the pool's infrastructure. Full block reward if you find a block - nothing if you don't. Only viable for very large hashrate deployments.

#1 F2Pool - Best Overall for ZEC Miners

F2Pool is one of the world's largest and most established mining pools, with robust Zcash support. Its PPS+ payout scheme delivers consistent daily earnings, making it ideal for miners who want predictable revenue to offset electricity bills. The 1% fee is competitive, the web dashboard is clean and informative, and the pool has proven uptime reliability. With servers globally distributed, latency is low for most miners regardless of location. Recommended for most ZEC miners, especially those running multiple machines.

#2 2Miners - Best PPLNS Option

2Miners offers both PPLNS and SOLO modes for Zcash, giving miners flexibility. The PPLNS mode has a 1% fee and strong community support. Their dashboard is particularly detailed - you get per-worker hashrate, share history, and earnings breakdown. The minimum payout (0.01 ZEC) is slightly higher than F2Pool's but still achievable within a few days for Z15 Pro operators. Their SOLO pool is popular among miners who want to try for full block rewards with their own hardware.

#3 Luxor - Lowest Fee, North America Focus

Luxor's 0.5% fee is the lowest among major ZEC pools - half of most competitors. For high-hashrate operations, this fee difference compounds meaningfully over time. Luxor is US-focused with strong transparency and a clean reporting interface. The higher minimum payout (0.1 ZEC) means slightly less frequent payouts, but the fee saving typically outweighs the cash flow timing difference for most miners. Strong choice for North American operators seeking the lowest overhead.

#4 ViaBTC - Established, Flexible

ViaBTC is a veteran mining pool with ZEC support and both PPS and PPLNS options. Their fee range (1–4%) is wider than competitors - ensure you're selecting the right mode to avoid the higher fee tiers. The very low minimum payout (0.0001 ZEC) makes ViaBTC appealing for miners who want daily micro-payouts. Solid uptime history and good mobile app support.

Which Pool Should You Choose?

For most ZEC miners: F2Pool for maximum reliability and predictable payouts, or Luxor if you're in North America and want to minimise fees. Run our profitability calculator with different fee percentages to see the annual earnings difference for your specific hashrate.