Helium Mining and Rewards Overview

Requirements to Provide Helium Coverage and Mine Tokens

In order to provide coverage for the Helium network and earn tokens, you will need a Hotspot from an approved Maker (such as MNTD.) which provides coverage for one of the various subnetworks (at this time IOT or MOBILE). The Hotspot must be onboarded to the subnetwork(s) in order to be rewarded for providing coverage and must also have its location asserted and antenna or radio information set. These pieces of information are recorded during the onboarding process.

Onboarded Hotspots are represented by Solana-based NFTs (non-fungible tokens) which are linked to the Hotspot's public key and belong to the Hotspot owner's wallet. The public key (pubkey) is a unique identifier which belongs only to a single Hotspot and is stored in a secure chip inside the Hotspot hardware. Hotspot NFTs represent the Hotspot miners on the network and serve as proof of ownership for the purposes of transferring ownership, updating location or antenna details, and claiming mining rewards.

In order to earn token rewards, Hotspots must participate in Proof of Coverage functions as outlined by the specific subnetwork(s) they are onboarded to and/or participate in transferring data for users of the subnetwork(s).

Claiming Mining Rewards

Mining rewards are paid out in the specific subnetwork token for the network(s) the miner belongs to (currently IOT or MOBILE) and miners are no longer rewarded with HNT.

Rewards earned by Hotspots are not automatically deposited to your wallet and instead accumulate per-Hotspot NFT and must be claimed in order to transfer to your wallet. The Helium Rewards Oracle keeps track of the amount of rewards earned by each specific Hotspot along with the lifetime rewards payout and the current unclaimed rewards amounts. 

Currently, the Helium Wallet app must be used to claim Hotspot mining rewards, however it is expected other wallet software developers may add this functionality in the future. The rewards claiming process is a transaction on the Solana blockchain and thus is subject to transaction fees. The fee to claim rewards for a single Hotspot is 0.00001 SOL (equivalent to $0.0002 USD at current prices). Claiming rewards for additional Hotspots adds a small amount of transaction complexity and thus the gas fee increases slightly. This is substantially cheaper than previous transaction amounts on the now-defunct Helium blockchain, which were 35,000 DC (equivalent to $0.35 USD).

The Rewards Oracle keeps track of all Hotspot rewards and previous payouts and so there is no set timeframe within which rewards must be claimed. Rewards can be claimed as often or as infrequently as you wish - some users may choose to postpone claiming rewards until market conditions make the transaction more favorable for tax purposes. Please be aware that each rewards claim transaction will require a small fee in SOL to pay for the transaction.

Rewards are issued to Hotspot NFTs once per day at 1:00am UTC, after which the pending rewards balance will reflect the new token amounts.

Claiming Individual Hotspot Rewards

Open the Helium Wallet app and ensure you are signed into the wallet that owns your Hotspot(s). If you have multiple wallets that own a Hotspot(s), claiming will need to be done on a per-wallet basis.

Tap on the Collectables tab (second tab, diamond icon). Tap on the individual Hotspot NFT you wish to claim mining rewards from.

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On the Hotspot Detail screen, tap the Claim Rewards button. You will see a summary of the amount of subnetwork tokens earned since last claim (the amount you will receive). Click the Claim Rewards button to claim rewards.

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Review the estimated token changes (reflecting transaction fees) and click Approve to sign the claim rewards transaction. You will see a brief loading screen showing "Claiming your Rewards.." At this point, you can tap the Return to Collectables button and the process will complete in the background.

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Staying on the "Claiming your Rewards..." page for several seconds will allow you to see the "Rewards Claimed!" confirmation message. Going back to the Wallet Overview tab (first tab, $ icon) will allow you to see your new token balances.

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Claiming All Hotspot Rewards

Open the Helium Wallet app and ensure you are signed into the wallet that owns your Hotspots. If you have multiple wallets that own Hotspots, claiming will need to be done on a per-wallet basis.

Tap on the Collectables tab (second tab, diamond icon). Tap on the Claim all Rewards button. The screen will show how many Hotspots are having their rewards claimed along with a summary of the amount of subnetwork tokens earned since last claim (the amounts you will receive). Click the Claim all Rewards button to claim rewards.

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You will see a brief loading icon before the screen changes to show "Claiming your Rewards.." The center of the screen will display the transaction progress as there are multiple claim rewards transactions being processed. At this point, you can tap the Return to Collectables button and the process will complete in the background.

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Staying on the "Claiming your Rewards..." page for several seconds will allow you to see the "Rewards Claimed!" confirmation message. Going back to the Wallet Overview tab (first tab, $ icon) will allow you to see your new token balances.

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Claiming from Multiple Wallets

After claiming rewards from Hotspots in the first wallet, on the Wallet Summary tab (first tab, $ icon), tap the Wallet Name dropdown at the top center of the screen. Select the next wallet from the list to switch to it. Once you've switched to the new wallet, follow the same rewards claiming process as outlined above. Repeat the wallet switch process for any remaining wallets that need Hotspot rewards claimed.

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Exchanging Mining Rewards and "Cashing Out"

Treasury Swap

Hotspot mining rewards are issued in subnetwork tokens for the network(s) the Hotspot is participating in. As outlined in HIP-51, Hotspot owners can swap their subnetwork tokens for HNT via programmatic treasury swap. Each subnetwork treasury is awarded a portion of the epoch emission of HNT which it can use to buy back all circulating subnetwork tokens. The swap value of subnetwork tokens changes regularly as it is based on several factors.

The current amount of HNT in the subnetwork treasury divided by the amount of circulating subnetwork tokens provides the current treasury value for the subnetwork tokens. As an example, if the IOT subDAO's treasury had a balance of 10,000 HNT and there was a circulating supply of 100,000,000 IOT, the treasury swap would pay 0.0001 HNT per IOT exchanged.

Treasury swaps are transactions on the Solana blockchain and as such, there is a small transaction fee of 0.000005 SOL.

To perform a treasury swap, open the Helium Wallet app and ensure you are signed into the wallet that owns the funds you wish to exchange. On the Wallet Summary tab (first tab, $ icon), tap the yellow Swap -><- button.

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On the Swap my Tokens page, tap the token type on the You Pay field to choose the subnetwork token you wish to exchange for HNT. Tap the desired subnetwork token from the list.

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Under the You Pay section, tap the 0 amount field and type in the desired number of tokens to swap, or tap the Max button to swap the entire token balance. Tap the Swap Tokens button to begin the swap.

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Review the swap details as well as the SOL transaction fee. When ready, tap Approve.

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The "Swapping your tokens..." page will display temporarily. At this point, you can tap the Return to Swaps button and the process will complete in the background.

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Once complete, the "Tokens swapped!" page will be displayed. Going back to the Wallet Overview tab (first tab, $ icon) will allow you to see your new token balances.

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Open Market/Decentralized Exchange Swap

Hotspot mining rewards can be swapped on the open market for HNT, SOL, or USDC among other tokens using centralized exchanges or decentralized finance applications such as Jupiter Aggregator, Raydium, SolDex, and more. Open market prices are not guaranteed to match treasury swap values and can be highly volatile and as such, additional research is recommended prior to making swap decisions.

To swap tokens using the Helium Wallet app, visit the Browser tab (far right tab, globe icon) and tap on the https://jup.ag link to open Jupiter Aggregator inside the Helium Wallet app. Once opened, tap the Connect or Connect Wallet button to connect to your wallet to access the tokens.

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In the list of wallets, tap Helium. Tap Connect to connect your wallet to Jupiter.

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Once successfully connected, you should see the Wallet Connected message at the bottom of the screen. Under the You're paying section and To receive section, tap the token names to choose the desired tokens to sell and receive respectively. Select the tokens from the common tokens lists or search for a token in the Search by token or paste address field.

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In the You're paying area, tap the amount field and enter the amount of tokens you wish to sell. You can also tap the HALF or MAX buttons to sell half or all of your token balance respectively. The To receive field will dynamically show the new total tokens you will receive for selling the entered amount. When done, tap the Swap button. Review the swap information, and tap Approve when ready.

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Receiving Fiat (US Dollars, Euros, etc)

To receive fiat (US Dollars, Euros, etc) for your mining rewards, you must either send your HNT to a centralized exchange that supports HNT on Solana where you can sell for fiat value, or exchange for another token (such as USDC) which is supported by an exchange. You can then send the supported token to an exchange where you can sell it for fiat value.

Users are encouraged to be aware of their local tax laws when performing cryptocurrency mining reward claims, token swaps, and selling tokens for fiat.

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