<p>The others didn't notice, that the maximum block size is 1 MB now, so teoretically the bitcoin blockchain can grow by 6 MB per hour which makes 144 MB per day, which makes 52.5 GB per year!</p>

<p>This is, hovewer, highly unlikely. There are two reasons:</p>

<ol>
<li>People do not use full block. This is just not needed at the time being.</li>
<li>Some miners prefer smaller blocks (because they are slighty easier to crack). Some pools, like Ghash.io do not even produce blocks > 300 kb. </li>
</ol>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-11T18:46:02.490Z
2014-04-11T18:46:02.490Z
Maciej Mączko
<p>Bitcoin-qt maintains a copy of the blockchain, which should be local for performance and trust reasons. It's not designed to have its copy of the blockchain stored on a remote server.</p>

<p>If the storage requirement is excessive for you, the solution is to use a lightweight client that does not require a copy of the blockchain, such as Electrum or Multibit.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-11T18:44:57.750Z
heh, interesting, the simple it/its typo made it incomprehensible to me; it did make sense if read with 'its' but my brain didn't see that. I like your new verion better tho, thanks.
dchapes
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-11T18:53:19.693Z
This is just plain wrong. There is nothing wrong with storing blockchain the cloud, however, storing unsecured private keys in the cloud  is. You can always sign transactions at localhost and use clouded bitcoind to broadcast it.
Maciej Mączko
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-13T12:37:14.163Z
@MaciejMączko: I'm afraid you're mistaken. Signing transactions is easy enough as you said, the tricky part is verifying that you've received payment. Running a local full node gives you the best surety, an SPV client is worse, and a hybrid client (a la blockchain.info) is worse. In any case, what the OP asked about is running bitcoin-qt locally (not using a hybrid wallet). As I said it's not designed to work with a blockchain copy on a remote server.
Meni Rosenfeld
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-13T15:04:54.010Z
@MeniRosenfeld: You are right.
Maciej Mączko
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-03-12T09:35:17.873Z
2014-04-11T13:14:13.053Z
2014-04-11T13:14:13.053Z
Meni Rosenfeld
<p>The blockchain size growth is kind of approximately linear at this time (although I wouldn't expect it to continue linearly). See the nice graph at <a href="https://blockchain.info/charts/blocks-size" rel="nofollow">https://blockchain.info/charts/blocks-size</a> and particularly check the "All Time" scale option.</p>

<p>Over the past year, the blockchain size has grown by approximately 10 GB. On average, that would be around 27 MB per day, or 1.1 MB per hour.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-11T18:38:50.510Z
You didn't take under consideration the growth of a single block, therefore your calculations are wrong.
Maciej Mączko
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-12T04:29:41.917Z
@MaciejMączko: I don't quite understand what you mean. After a block is created, it does not grow any further. My estimates are based on the total size, which certainly includes the size of each block.
Greg Hewgill
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-12T13:04:12.810Z
@GregHewgill : Once the block has been created, it cannot be resized - true. However, max block size has been changed in bitcoind 0.8. Previously, it was 300kB (citation needed), now it is 1024kB. Therefore, blockchain can grow by 6 MB per hour, not by 1.1 as you have stated.
Maciej Mączko
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-04-12T18:45:31.983Z
@MaciejMączko: I was not calculating the *maximum* blockchain growth rate, only the average *observed* growth rate over the past year. The maximum blockchain growth rate would have been about 1.8 MB per hour at 300 kB per block, or up to 6 MB per hour at 1024 kB per block.
Greg Hewgill
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-10T09:01:46.080Z
2014-02-10T09:01:46.080Z
Greg Hewgill
<p>the blockchain is about 20GB today, but i was wondering how much space does it take up each day if i were to leave bitcoinqt on regularly? also by hour? reason why im asking is im thinking about just putting the blockchain in my cloud drive (bitcasa.com) as my laptop has only so much space. if its not too much space that means it wont be a bandwidth hog when its uploading it to cloud drive after it downloads it. </p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-10T07:55:48.637Z
Leaving your Bitcoin-qt software open doesn't make it magically start taking up space. It a network-wide growth.
John T
<blockchain><synchronization><storage-footprint>
How much space does the blockchain take up per day and per hour when running bitcoinQT on my computer?
Patoshi パトシ
# How much space does the blockchain take up per day and per hour when running bitcoinQT on my computer?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2014-02-10)

the blockchain is about 20GB today, but i was wondering how much space does it take up each day if i were to leave bitcoinqt on regularly? also by hour? reason why im asking is im thinking about just putting the blockchain in my cloud drive (bitcasa.com) as my laptop has only so much space. if its not too much space that means it wont be a bandwidth hog when its uploading it to cloud drive after it downloads it.

**Tags:** blockchain, synchronization, storage-footprint

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Leaving your Bitcoin-qt software open doesn't make it magically start taking up space. It a network-wide growth.  

---

## 3 answers

### Answer by username_5 on 2014-02-10. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

The blockchain size growth is kind of approximately linear at this time (although I wouldn't expect it to continue linearly). See the nice graph at <https://blockchain.info/charts/blocks-size> and particularly check the "All Time" scale option.

Over the past year, the blockchain size has grown by approximately 10 GB. On average, that would be around 27 MB per day, or 1.1 MB per hour.

> **Comments:**
> **username_2**: You didn't take under consideration the growth of a single block, therefore your calculations are wrong.  
> **username_5**: @username_2: I don't quite understand what you mean. After a block is created, it does not grow any further. My estimates are based on the total size, which certainly includes the size of each block.  
> **username_2**: @username_5 : Once the block has been created, it cannot be resized - true. However, max block size has been changed in bitcoind 0.8. Previously, it was 300kB (citation needed), now it is 1024kB. Therefore, blockchain can grow by 6 MB per hour, not by 1.1 as you have stated.  
> **username_5**: @username_2: I was not calculating the *maximum* blockchain growth rate, only the average *observed* growth rate over the past year. The maximum blockchain growth rate would have been about 1.8 MB per hour at 300 kB per block, or up to 6 MB per hour at 1024 kB per block.  

---

### Answer by username_2 on 2014-04-11. Score: 3

The others didn't notice, that the maximum block size is 1 MB now, so teoretically the bitcoin blockchain can grow by 6 MB per hour which makes 144 MB per day, which makes 52.5 GB per year!

This is, hovewer, highly unlikely. There are two reasons:

1. People do not use full block. This is just not needed at the time being.
2. Some miners prefer smaller blocks (because they are slighty easier to crack). Some pools, like Ghash.io do not even produce blocks > 300 kb.


---

### Answer by username_3 on 2014-03-12. Score: 1

Bitcoin-qt maintains a copy of the blockchain, which should be local for performance and trust reasons. It's not designed to have its copy of the blockchain stored on a remote server.

If the storage requirement is excessive for you, the solution is to use a lightweight client that does not require a copy of the blockchain, such as Electrum or Multibit.

> **Comments:**
> **username_4**: heh, interesting, the simple it/its typo made it incomprehensible to me; it did make sense if read with 'its' but my brain didn't see that. I like your new verion better tho, thanks.  
> **username_2**: This is just plain wrong. There is nothing wrong with storing blockchain the cloud, however, storing unsecured private keys in the cloud  is. You can always sign transactions at localhost and use clouded bitcoind to broadcast it.  
> **username_3**: @username_2: I'm afraid you're mistaken. Signing transactions is easy enough as you said, the tricky part is verifying that you've received payment. Running a local full node gives you the best surety, an SPV client is worse, and a hybrid client (a la blockchain.info) is worse. In any case, what the OP asked about is running bitcoin-qt locally (not using a hybrid wallet). As I said it's not designed to work with a blockchain copy on a remote server.  
> **username_2**: @username_3: You are right.  

---

