What Are the Key Metrics of a Pool’s Performance That Miners Evaluate before Joining?

Miners primarily evaluate the pool's total hash rate (indicating block discovery consistency), the pool fee structure (PPS, PROP, PPLNS, and the percentage), and the pool's historical "luck" or variance. They also check the pool's uptime and server latency, which directly impact the rate of stale shares.

Finally, the minimum payout threshold and the transparency of reporting are also critical for assessing reliability and fairness.