The cost of protecting bitcoin against quantum computing has sharply dropped in a few days. An open competition led by StarkWare, Yukon Research, and Eigen Labs allowed developers and AI agen
The cost of protecting bitcoin against quantum computing has sharply dropped in a few days. An open competition led by StarkWare, Yukon Research, and Eigen Labs allowed developers and AI agents to speed up the necessary calculations. In one week, the estimate went from about 320 dollars to 67 dollars in GPU computation. This decrease especially shows how code optimization can reduce the resources needed to build transactions capable of better resisting the quantum threat.
The Quantum-Safe Bitcoin Optimization Challenge aims to reduce the cost of creating a quantum-resistant transaction. StarkWare, Yukon Research, and Eigen Labs launched this competition to measure the progress of external solvers. The dashboard now places the estimated cost around 67 dollars in GPU computation. One week earlier, it was around 320 dollars.
The first quantum-resistant transaction was mined on the main network last month. The technology developed by StarkWare aims to protect bitcoins without requiring a network fork. Its initial build required approximately 3,100 GPU compute hours and cost 320 dollars. The competition has since reduced that load.
This drop mainly comes from computational optimization. The most costly process is exhaustive searching before registering data on the blockchain. The mechanism inserts a hash where the network expects a signature. Since a valid output appears in about one combination out of 70 trillion, inputs must be hashed until the desired result is found.
Your 1st cryptos with CoinbaseThis link uses an affiliate program.Solvers have made rapid progress on the references used to measure their performance. On a standard RTX 4090, a benchmark went from 146 million candidates verified per second to over 820 million. In total, 62 improvements were observed. These results directly reduce the number of GPU hours required.
Developers using AI models notably achieved the best records. StarkWare cites Opus 5 and Fable 5.1 from Anthropic at the top of the leaderboard. GPT-6 Astra, Grok 4.6, and Kimi from OpenAI were just behind. The competition shows AI’s growing role in calculation optimization.
The issue remains technical, however, and the figure of 67 dollars thus requires careful interpretation. StarkWare specifies that the figure is an estimate based on specific hardware assumptions, not a market price. This amount can change each time a solver breaks the record. The drop thus reflects the state of the competition rather than a fixed rate.
This breakthrough does not make Bitcoin unbreakable against quantum computing. The transactions involved remain non-standard and must be sent directly to a miner. The device also only protects bitcoins whose public key has not yet been disclosed. StarkWare considers a software fork to be the long-term solution.
These limits gain special importance around “Q-Day.” This term refers to the hypothetical moment when quantum computers could break wallet encryption. The potential network exposure to this development attracts more attention. Coinbase is already working on a post-quantum custody strategy.
For now, the competition mostly measures progress in terms of calculation cost. The drop from 320 to 67 dollars shows the effect of optimization by developers and AI models. However, this solution only addresses some of the issues related to quantum resistance. Future records may again change the estimate. This evolution concerns bitcoin and its users.
Protection of BTC against quantum computing therefore advances on the computation front, while its limits remain clearly identified. The estimated cost has greatly decreased, but this method is not yet comprehensive network protection. As solvers improve their performances, the cost might continue to evolve without changing the fundamental constraints recalled by StarkWare.
