Bitcoin Investment Calculator
What would buying BTC have been worth? Pick a plan and a start date and this replays it against real daily Bitcoin closes.
What BTC actually did, in the data this page replays
Measured from the 5,506 daily closes this page replays — 18 August 2011 to 13 September 2026, from Bitstamp. Figures are bounded by that window, not by the asset’s whole life.
| History available | 15 years and 1 month (from Bitstamp) |
|---|---|
| Bought on the first day, held to the last | 7,081× |
| Highest close in this window | $124,728 on 6 October 2025 |
| Where it sits against that high | 38.1% below |
| Deepest fall | −84.9%, 4 December 2013 → 14 January 2015 |
| Time to get back to that peak | 2 years and 1 month after the low — 23 February 2017 |
| Separate falls of 50% or more | 7 |
| Days spent more than 20% below a previous peak | 74.4% |
| Best calendar year | 2013: +5,437.1% |
| Worst calendar year | 2018: -72.5% |
| Annualised volatility | 81.3% |
BTC year by year
First close to last close each year. 2011 and 2026 are partial — the data starts mid-2011 and 2026 is still running.
| Year | Change | Note |
|---|---|---|
| 2011 | -58% | partial year |
| 2012 | +164.8% | |
| 2013 | +5,437.1% | best full year |
| 2014 | -57.5% | |
| 2015 | +37.3% | |
| 2016 | +122.7% | |
| 2017 | +1,291.1% | |
| 2018 | -72.5% | worst full year |
| 2019 | +87.5% | |
| 2020 | +303.9% | |
| 2021 | +57.2% | |
| 2022 | -65.4% | |
| 2023 | +154.3% | |
| 2024 | +111.3% | |
| 2025 | -7.3% | |
| 2026 | -13% | partial year |
The part the calculator does not show you
Held from the first day in this data to the last, BTC returned 7,081×. That headline is the easy part. The number underneath it is that the position spent 74.4% of all days more than 20% below a previous peak — so for most of the time you owned it, you were looking at a figure lower than one you had already seen.
The deepest fall took BTC down 84.9%, from $1,132.01 on 4 December 2013 to $171.41 on 14 January 2015 — 13 months of falling. Getting back to that peak took a further 2 years and 1 month, reached on 23 February 2017. Add those together and the round trip was 3 years and 3 months — the length of time someone who bought at the top had to hold before they were merely even again.
81.3% annualised volatility is ordinary for a major crypto asset and still several times a stock index. All BTC calculators →
Frequently asked questions
＋Would buying BTC on the first day of this data and holding have made money?
Yes — 7,081× from 18 August 2011 to 13 September 2026. The figure is real but it is also the single luckiest entry available in this window, and it required holding through a fall of 84.9% on the way. Set the calculator to a date you might plausibly have chosen instead and the answer usually changes a great deal.
＋What is the worst BTC has fallen?
84.9% in this data, from 4 December 2013 down to 14 January 2015 — 13 months of falling. It took a further 2 years and 1 month to get back to that peak, on 23 February 2017, so the full round trip was 3 years and 3 months. Bear in mind our BTC series starts in 2011; a deeper fall before that date would not appear here.
＋How often does BTC lose half its value?
7 separate falls of 50% or more appear in this data, and the position spent 74.4% of all days more than 20% below a previous peak. A drop of that size is not an exceptional event for this asset — it is a recurring feature of the record, which is the thing to size a position around.
＋What were BTC's best and worst years?
2013 was the best at +5,437.1%, and 2018 the worst at -72.5%. The gap between those two is the reason a single average annual return is a poor description of this asset: almost nobody experiences the average, they experience one of the two extremes depending on when they bought.
＋Is 15 years and 1 month of data enough to trust this backtest?
It is among the longer records available here — 15 years and 1 month covering several complete cycles, which is enough for the drawdown and recovery figures to carry real weight. It is still one path that already happened, and the next sequence of prices has no obligation to resemble it.
What to keep in mind for BTC
BTC is the least volatile of the majors but still routinely moves 5–10% in a day and has drawn down more than 70% in past bear markets.
On-chain BTC fees are paid per byte of block space and spike when the mempool fills, so plan withdrawals around quiet periods; exchange trading fees usually dwarf them for small positions.
A backtest is one path that already happened. It shows what this plan produced through the exact sequence of prices BTC went through — not what a similar plan will produce through a sequence nobody has seen yet.