Mining Grid

The mining grid is the core interface for deploying SOL in Smelted. Every round, a fresh 5x5 grid of tiles opens for deployment. Miners select tiles, deploy SOL, and a single winning tile is determined on-chain when the round ends.

The 5x5 Grid

Each mining round presents a grid of 25 tiles, numbered 0 through 24 (arranged as 5 rows and 5 columns). Any miner can deploy SOL to any tile. Multiple miners can deploy to the same tile, and a single miner can deploy to multiple tiles in the same round.

The grid displays real-time information for each tile:

• Total SOL deployed — How much SOL has been committed to this tile by all miners combined.
• Number of deployers — How many unique miners have deployed to this tile.
• EV indicator — A color-coded expected value overlay showing how favorable each tile is relative to others.
• Your deployment — If you have already deployed to a tile this round, your amount is highlighted.

Tile Selection

When mining manually, click a tile on the grid to select it for deployment. You can select multiple tiles by clicking additional tiles. Selected tiles are highlighted, and the deploy panel shows the total amount that will be deployed across your selected tiles.

The SOL amount you specify in the deploy panel is deployed per tile. If you select 3 tiles and set 0.01 SOL, you will deploy 0.03 SOL total (0.01 to each tile).

Round Lifecycle

Mining rounds follow a predictable lifecycle across all protocols:

1. Round opens — A new round is created on-chain with a fresh grid. The round timer begins counting down.
2. Deployment phase — Miners deploy SOL to tiles. The grid updates in real time via server-sent events (SSE) as new deployments arrive.
3. Round closes — When the timer expires, the round closes and no more deployments are accepted.
4. Winner determination — The winning tile is determined on-chain from the Solana slot hash. Specifically, four 64-bit values are extracted from the slot hash, XOR-ed together, and the result is taken modulo 25 to produce a tile index (0-24).
5. Reward distribution — Miners who deployed to the winning tile receive rewards proportional to their share of that tile's total deployment.
6. Next round — A new round begins and the cycle repeats.

The round timer is displayed prominently on the mining page. For ORE and GODL, rounds typically last around 60 seconds, though the exact timing depends on Solana block production.

EV Indicators

Each tile on the grid displays a color-coded expected value (EV) indicator to help you make informed deployment decisions:

• Green — Above-average EV. Less SOL deployed relative to other tiles, meaning a win here pays more per SOL deployed.
• Yellow — Average EV. The tile is neither particularly favorable nor unfavorable.
• Red — Below-average EV. Heavy deployment on this tile means your share of the reward would be relatively small if it wins.

EV is calculated as the expected return per SOL deployed, accounting for the 1-in-25 base probability of any tile winning and the total SOL pool for that tile versus the round total. The protocol's cut (10-10.9% depending on the protocol) is factored into the calculation.

Manual vs Auto

Smelted supports both manual and automated deployment:

Manual Mining

• You select tiles and click Deploy each round.
• Full control over tile selection and timing.
• Can react to real-time deployment patterns.
• Requires active attention during each round.

AutoMiner

• Deploys automatically every round using your chosen strategy.
• Runs server-side — works even when your browser is closed.
• Consistent execution without emotional bias.
• Configurable budget limits for risk management.

You can switch between manual and auto at any time. If the AutoMiner is running, you can still observe the grid and see where it deploys. To take manual control, stop the AutoMiner first.

For a detailed look at AutoMiner strategies, see the Strategies page.