We tested three firmware variants on a Whatsminer M50 (70 TH/s stock) over 14 days in a 25°C ambient environment.
Whatsminer custom firmware is not a universal upgrade but a situational tool. For miners with low-cost power (<$0.04/kWh), high-performance firmware yields maximum absolute revenue despite higher failure rates. For miners with expensive power or limited cooling, low-power custom firmware provides genuine efficiency gains over stock. However, due to security risks and voided warranties, custom firmware should be limited to small, technically supervised fleets. We advise that future research focus on open-source, verifiable firmware builds (e.g., based on OpenFirmware for ASICs) to mitigate the current opaque ecosystem. whatsminer custom firmware
We model a 1 MW farm (approx. 280 M50 units). We tested three firmware variants on a Whatsminer