What the MVRV ratio is
MVRV stands for Market Value to Realized Value. It is Bitcoin's market capitalisation divided by its realized capitalisation, and it tells you how today's market price relates to what the supply last changed hands for on-chain. An MVRV of 1.61, the reading on 22 September 2026, means the market prices the total supply at 1.61 times its aggregate cost basis. An MVRV of exactly 1 would mean market price and cost basis coincide.
The live figure with its 30-day range is in the on-chain section of the Bitcoin page. This guide explains where it comes from, what the historical record looks like, and, at some length, what the number does not say.
How MVRV is calculated
Two inputs, one division.
Market Value is the ordinary market cap: current price multiplied by circulating supply. On 22 September 2026 that is about 1.73 trillion US dollars.
Realized Value is the Realized Cap: every unspent output valued at the price on the day it was created, summed. About 1.07 trillion dollars on the same date. The Realized Price guide walks through that calculation in detail; here it is enough to know that Realized Cap is the network's aggregate cost basis.
Divide: 1.73 ÷ 1.07 ≈ 1.61.
Because supply appears in both numerator and denominator, MVRV is also simply market price divided by Realized Price: 86,100 ÷ 53,400 ≈ 1.61. Same number, easier to sanity-check against the two values on the Bitcoin page.
Where MVRV comes from
The ratio was published in October 2018 by Murad Mahmudov and David Puell, a few weeks after Nic Carter and Antoine Le Calvez presented the Realized Cap concept. A pseudonymous analyst then normalised it by standard deviation to create the MVRV Z-Score. Since then it has become the most widely quoted on-chain valuation metric for Bitcoin, which is exactly why it is worth understanding what it measures before reading anyone's chart of it.
What different MVRV values mean, arithmetically
| MVRV | Arithmetic meaning | Share of days since 2011 |
|---|---|---|
| Below 1 | Market price below aggregate cost basis. The supply, weighted by amount, is held at an unrealised loss. | about 13% |
| 1 to 2 | Market price up to twice the cost basis. | about 55% |
| 2 to 3 | Market price two to three times the cost basis. | about 24% |
| Above 3 | Market price more than three times the cost basis. | under 8% |
The right-hand column is computed from the full Bitcoin Research Kit daily series, 1 January 2011 to 22 September 2026, roughly 5,740 days. It is a frequency table, not a scale of good and bad. It tells you that a reading of 1.6 is in the most common band and that readings above 3 have been historically rare. It does not tell you what comes next.
MVRV since 2011: what the record shows
A few facts from the series, offered as description only.
Highest readings. MVRV peaked above 7 in June 2011 and above 6 in November 2013, when the network was tiny and most coins had been created at prices near zero. In later cycles the ceiling was lower: 4.71 in December 2017, 3.99 in February 2021, 2.79 in March 2024 and 2.52 in January 2025. The lower peaks partly reflect a maturing cost basis: as more supply gets re-tagged at higher prices, the denominator grows and the ratio compresses.
Readings below 1. Since 2011 MVRV has closed below 1 on about 13 percent of days. Counted strictly, as unbroken runs of consecutive daily closes below 1, that is 31 separate runs, because a ratio hovering near 1 crosses the line back and forth. Grouped by calendar stretch, the picture is four longer periods and a scattering of brief dips. The longer ones: late 2011 (September to December, lowest 0.40), January to October 2015 (a 191-day run to July, then a further 84-day run from 31 July, lowest 0.39), 21 November 2018 to 1 April 2019 (132 unbroken days, lowest 0.70) and June 2022 to January 2023 (180 days below 1 in five runs, lowest 0.75). The brief ones: 33 days spread across January to April 2012, none longer than nine in a row; 18 days between October and December 2014 in runs of one to four; and six daily readings in March 2020 (12 March and 14 to 18 March, lowest 0.90). Each was a stretch in which the average holder sat on an unrealised loss. The lengths range from a single day to more than six months.
The summer of 2015 shows why the counting rule matters. After the low on 14 January (0.39, price 120 dollars against a Realized Price of 311), the ratio stayed below 1 until 10 July, crossed above the line for five days, dropped back for eight days in mid-July, recovered briefly once more, and then sat below 1 again for 84 days from 31 July to 22 October. Read as "four periods", that is one long trough. Read from the daily series, it is three runs with two short breathers. Both describe the same data; which version ends up on a chart is the author's call, not the ledger's. That is why CoinVett gives both counts.
The 2026 picture. MVRV started the year at 1.58, reached 1.73 in mid-January, fell to 1.10 at the end of June and stood at 1.61 on 22 September. The 30-day range on the Bitcoin page shows the most recent movement.
Readers who follow on-chain commentary will have seen these historical lows and highs turned into thresholds with instructions attached. That step is an interpretation the commentator adds. The series itself contains prices and cost bases. Nothing in it says what a ratio "should" do after touching a particular level, and the peaks above show that the levels themselves have shifted from cycle to cycle.
MVRV Z-Score and other variants
The MVRV Z-Score divides the difference between market cap and realized cap by the historical standard deviation of market cap. The intent is to make readings comparable across eras. The catch is that the standard deviation uses the full history, so early-year volatility stays in the denominator forever and peak readings decay structurally. CoinVett shows the plain ratio, not the Z-Score, because the plain ratio has a direct arithmetic meaning (price over cost basis) that the Z-Score does not.
Cohort MVRV splits the calculation by coin age: long-term holder MVRV, short-term holder MVRV, MVRV of coins one to two years old, and so on. Short-term holder MVRV hovers near 1 most of the time because recently moved coins were, by definition, recently priced.
MVRV for other assets exists in principle for any chain with a traceable cost basis, but on account-based chains like Ethereum the calculation depends on heuristics, and staking or burning changes the supply itself. Comparisons across assets are shaky.
MVRV and NUPL: one gap, two scales
NUPL, the metric shown next to MVRV on the Bitcoin page, is derived from the same two numbers: (market cap minus realized cap) divided by market cap. Algebraically NUPL equals 1 minus 1/MVRV. An MVRV of 1.61 gives a NUPL of 0.38; an MVRV of 1 gives 0; an MVRV of 0.5 gives −1. They carry the same information on different scales. The NUPL guide explains why the percentage framing is sometimes easier to read.
What MVRV cannot do
- It cannot say whether the market price is right. MVRV compares price with cost basis. A cost basis is what the supply last changed hands for on-chain, a proxy for what holders paid (lost coins and exchange wallets included), not what something is worth. Reading a ratio of 0.8 or 3.2 as a verdict on the price is a judgement the reader brings; the ledger holds no opinion.
- It cannot predict. Every input is a past block and a past price. The ratio is a snapshot of the ledger as of the last computed day.
- Its historical extremes are not thresholds. The highest reading of each cycle has fallen from above 7 to about 2.5. The lowest has ranged from 0.39 to 0.90. A level that marked an extreme in one era was unremarkable in another.
- It inherits every distortion of the Realized Cap. Lost coins pull the denominator down permanently. Custodial wallet consolidations re-tag large amounts of supply at today's price without any customer buying or selling. Change outputs update cost basis without anyone changing their position.
- It says nothing about you. Your position is in profit or loss relative to what you paid. The network's aggregate ratio has no bearing on that.
- It cannot see off-chain activity. Coins held in exchange or ETF custody that never move keep their old tag regardless of how many times the underlying claims trade hands.
The useful way to hold the number: on this date, the market priced Bitcoin's supply at this multiple of what the supply last changed hands for. Full stop.
Frequently asked questions
Is MVRV updated in real time?
Not on CoinVett. The Bitcoin Research Kit computes Realized Cap, and with it MVRV, per block and per day, so a finer series exists. CoinVett syncs the daily value once a day and shows it with its 30-day range; that is a product decision about what is worth displaying, not a limit of the metric. The "data as of" date on the Bitcoin page shows the last computed day. Intraday MVRV figures on other sites usually combine the latest daily Realized Cap with a live price, which moves the numerator minute by minute while the denominator sits still. That is a legitimate reading, just a different one, and it mostly tracks the price chart.
Why do MVRV values differ slightly between providers?
Mostly because of the historical price series used to tag old outputs. Exchange coverage before 2013 was thin and providers make different choices. Differences are typically in the second decimal place and do not change the shape of the series.
Where does CoinVett's MVRV come from?
From the Bitcoin Research Kit running against a full node CoinVett operates. When that node is unavailable, the public instance of the same open-source software at bitview.space supplies the value, and the source label next to the figure says which one it was. The methodology page has the details, including how stale data is handled.
Source and notice: Bitcoin Research Kit (own full node; public instance bitview.space as fallback, source shown per measurement). Historical values computed from the BRK daily series as of 22 September 2026. These figures are descriptions of historical on-chain data, not a valuation or a recommendation. Nothing on this page is investment advice.