AxeOS

AxeOS is the open-source web interface and management layer of ESP-Miner, the firmware that runs the Bitaxe family of single-chip Bitcoin mining devices and is, by deployment, the most widely used open-source mining firmware in the world, with well over 100,000 units in the field. Written in C on the ESP32-S3, it is the browser dashboard you use to monitor hashrate, set your pool, and tune voltage and frequency on an ESP32-powered miner.

Also known as: the Bitaxe web UI, the ESP-Miner dashboard.

Where AxeOS fits in the firmware stack

Strictly speaking, AxeOS is the front-end of ESP-Miner, the firmware maintained in the bitaxeorg/ESP-Miner repository and released under the GPL-3.0 license. ESP-Miner is written in C on top of Espressif's ESP-IDF framework and runs on an ESP32-S3 microcontroller, which acts as the control board for the miner. The chip talks to the mining ASIC over a serial link, hands it block templates, and collects the resulting work. AxeOS is the part of that stack you actually see: a small single-page web app served straight off the ESP32, with no cloud account, no telemetry phone-home, and no login server in the middle.

It grew out of the Bitaxe project started by the developer known as skot, the first fully open-source Bitcoin ASIC miner. Because the hardware is open KiCad and the firmware is GPL-3.0, AxeOS has become the most widely deployed piece of open-source firmware in Bitcoin mining, running on well over a hundred thousand units worldwide. It stands on the shoulders of earlier custom firmware efforts and, in turn, has become the reference others build on.

What the interface actually does

AxeOS exposes the day-to-day controls a home miner needs without dropping you into a terminal. From the dashboard you can read live hashrate, chip temperature, fan speed, input power, and accepted shares; point the device at a mining pool or at a solo endpoint; and adjust the ASIC's core voltage and clock frequency to balance efficiency against output. It also handles Wi-Fi setup and over-the-air (OTA) firmware updates, so a unit can be re-flashed from the browser rather than over a cable.

Under the hood, AxeOS is backed by a small HTTP REST API. Endpoints such as /api/system/info, /api/system/asic, and /api/system/statistics return JSON, while PATCH calls write settings and POST calls trigger actions like restart, identify, or OTA. That open API is why fleet tools and the pyasic library can recognize a Bitaxe simply by spotting the string "AxeOS" in the device's web response and then read or manage it programmatically.

Why a home miner cares

If you are running a Bitaxe on a desk, a shelf, or as a small lottery-mining rig, AxeOS is the entire operator experience. It is where you confirm the chip is hashing, where you nudge frequency and voltage to chase a better J/TH figure, and where you watch temperature so you do not cook the board. The firmware covers the BM13xx ASIC family, from the legacy BM1397 through the BM1366, BM1368, and current BM1370, so the same interface follows you from an older Max up to a Gamma. It speaks the Stratum V1 protocol, which is all a single-chip solo or pool miner needs.

For sovereign Bitcoiners, the appeal is that the whole loop stays local: the firmware is auditable, the hardware is documented, and nothing about your mining is mediated by a vendor cloud. That ethos is the same one driving D-Central's own work toward DCENT_OS, a Rust firmware aimed at full-size miners and still in closed beta ahead of a public release planned for summer 2026. AxeOS is one more layer of the mining stack made open and inspectable. If you want hands-on hardware, the Bitaxe hub and our open-source miners are the place to start; when you want to tune harder, the overclocking and undervolting entries explain the trade-offs.

Related terms: Bitaxe, ESP32, open-source firmware, custom firmware, BM1370, solo mining