Issuance in Plain English

Bitcoin releases new coins as rewards to miners when they add a new block. The reward starts high and halves at a fixed schedule. Over time, new supply gets smaller and smaller.

Simple definitions:\n\n• Block reward: New BTC given to the miner of a block.\n• Halving: The block reward is cut in half every 210,000 blocks (≈ 4 years).\n• Issuance (new supply): How many new coins are created over time.\n• 21 million cap: The total number of bitcoin that will ever exist.