<p>In the very early days of Bitcoin the time between blocks could vary a lot since there were so few people using it (so the total hash rate was very unpredictable). I'm pretty sure the biggest gap would be between <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/b/0">block 0</a> and <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/b/1">block 1</a> (5½ days), probably because nobody was mining.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-12-28T18:42:18.753Z
Good answer, but I'm actually interested in present day. Say ... in the last month, how many blocks took < 10 minutes, how many took < 20, how many took < 30 minutes, etc...
ripper234
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-12-29T13:22:17.087Z
Agreed, this is surely the answer, but you have prompted me to restate the question to refer to just the last year.
jl6
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-12-28T14:21:37.463Z
2011-12-28T14:21:37.463Z
D.H.
<p>I wrote a program that extracts the blockchain into an SQL database and ran a query. The answer is that block 152218 followed block 152217 after a delay of 1 hour 39 minutes 7 seconds. This was the longest inter-block interval in 2011. There were many longer interval in the early history of the blockchain, often multiple hours or days.</p>

<p>Edit: I also find it interesting that there have been 78 blocks where the inter-arrival time was less than one second.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-10-06T11:15:58.627Z
are these times reliable ? Is the time-stamp of every block not set by the miner themselves? I imagine, the clocks can be misconfigured and there is no "central time" that we can refer to.
Martin Vegter
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-22T14:41:28.607Z
2012-01-22T14:49:18.593Z
2012-01-22T14:49:18.593Z
jl6
<p>I notice on blockexplorer that block 159531 was mined at 2011-12-28 10:53:53 and the next block was mined at 2011-12-28 11:24:58 - a gap of more than half an hour. I know the 10-minutes-per-block rule is just an average that the network tries to maintain, thus outliers are possible. So what's the longest we've had to wait for the next block to be mined, in the last year (2010 to 2011)?</p>

<p>Edit: clarifying that I'm interested in the longest gap between blocks in "recent history", which I arbitrarily define to be the last year.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-06-26T15:05:11.693Z
Is the goal to find the greatest difference between block timestamps, or greatest live-wait time? The former is do-able, but seems less interesting/useful. I think a more interesting question would be to find the correlation between block timestamp differences and live-wait differences on the network.
morsecoder
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-06-29T22:20:17.930Z
If the question refers to the last year, then it's not well-defined, because any answer will change. Wouldn't it be better to ask a new question rather than bounty an old one?
ike
<history><block-interval>
What is the longest time gap between blocks in 2010 - 2011?
jl6
# What is the longest time gap between blocks in 2010 - 2011?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2011-12-28)

I notice on blockexplorer that block 159531 was mined at 2011-12-28 10:53:53 and the next block was mined at 2011-12-28 11:24:58 - a gap of more than half an hour. I know the 10-minutes-per-block rule is just an average that the network tries to maintain, thus outliers are possible. So what's the longest we've had to wait for the next block to be mined, in the last year (2010 to 2011)?

Edit: clarifying that I'm interested in the longest gap between blocks in "recent history", which I arbitrarily define to be the last year.

**Tags:** history, block-interval

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Is the goal to find the greatest difference between block timestamps, or greatest live-wait time? The former is do-able, but seems less interesting/useful. I think a more interesting question would be to find the correlation between block timestamp differences and live-wait differences on the network.  
> **username_2**: If the question refers to the last year, then it's not well-defined, because any answer will change. Wouldn't it be better to ask a new question rather than bounty an old one?  

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## 2 answers

### Answer by username_0 on 2012-01-22. Score: 9 | Accepted answer

I wrote a program that extracts the blockchain into an SQL database and ran a query. The answer is that block 152218 followed block 152217 after a delay of 1 hour 39 minutes 7 seconds. This was the longest inter-block interval in 2011. There were many longer interval in the early history of the blockchain, often multiple hours or days.

Edit: I also find it interesting that there have been 78 blocks where the inter-arrival time was less than one second.

> **Comments:**
> **username_5**: are these times reliable ? Is the time-stamp of every block not set by the miner themselves? I imagine, the clocks can be misconfigured and there is no "central time" that we can refer to.  

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### Answer by username_3 on 2011-12-28. Score: 5

In the very early days of Bitcoin the time between blocks could vary a lot since there were so few people using it (so the total hash rate was very unpredictable). I'm pretty sure the biggest gap would be between [block 0](http://blockexplorer.com/b/0) and [block 1](http://blockexplorer.com/b/1) (5½ days), probably because nobody was mining.

> **Comments:**
> **username_4**: Good answer, but I'm actually interested in present day. Say ... in the last month, how many blocks took < 10 minutes, how many took < 20, how many took < 30 minutes, etc...  
> **username_0**: Agreed, this is surely the answer, but you have prompted me to restate the question to refer to just the last year.  

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