What is a Light Miner and why is this upgrade important?

The term “light miner” or “light hotspot” refers to the upcoming firmware update from Helium that will resolve issues with limited SD card memory, prolonged syncing, and relayed hotspots.

Light miners:

• Do not communicate over the peer-to-peer network, eliminating relay;
• Do not store a copy of the blockchain, eliminating sync phase and reducing bandwidth usage;
• Do not create challenges (rely on validators to create challenges on their behalf instead);
• Do not participate in consensus groups (rely on validators for block production).

This update is free to all hosts and will affect all Helium hotspots regardless of age, make, or model – converting all existing hardware into “light miners”. All hotspots will receive the update automatically, as long as they are connected to a power source.