So being a new user on Steemit platform I had many questions on the working of the platform. There are many things that I don't clearly understand and one of these things is the Steem Power down function. I decided to research about it so that I have a clear understanding on how to go power down effectively. While researching I saw that there were many articles on the steemit but the problem was that these articles were old and the rules of power down have changed now. After digging out a lot on this topic and and trying it for myself I finally understand the working of Steemit power down.
What is Steem Power ?
Before beginning let's understand what power down really means. So you must have seen in your Steem wallet that you have steem power and there is a value in front of it. Steempower is something that determines your capacity to make powerful votes on Steemit the more Steem Power you hold, the more your votes are worth plus the more you can earn through curation when you upvote posts from other people. So it's good to have more Steem Power as you can earn more in the long term by keeping it in the system.
Powering Down is the process of withdrawing your Steem Power so that you can spend it in the real world. You do this by converting your Steem Power to steem coins. In the past this process took 2 years and you would receive weekly payments over that 2 years that amounted to your total Steem Power in the system at the time you activated the process. Thankfully, now powering down only takes 13 weeks and not 2 years so it becomes a more viable way of using steemit to get paid and live life.
So to start the process, click on the arrow next to Steem Power within you wallet and then choose Power Down. Keep in mind that payouts are calculated based only on your current amount of steem power, they are not adjusted in subsequent payouts to take account of increases in SP(Steem Power) that you may receive in the future. The net result is that if you activate the power down process you will always receive payouts that are equal to 1/13 of your SP value at the time you started the process and this will not result in you retrieving all of your SP for example you powered down 130 SP then you will recieve 10 Steem every week for 13 weeks. This is actually a good thing from the perspective that you probably won't ever remove all of your SP so you will be able to continue using Steemit (you can't use Steemit if you have zero SP). However, if you are continually earning from posts on Steemit, you may notice that your SP value is going up at a rate that is higher than the rate you are receiving it in the power down process so your overall SP is not actually going down at all.
It is possible to cancel the power down process at any point and restart it, which will recalculate the payout value for the power down payouts. By canceling the power down process after you receive a payout and then restarting it, you will be able to maximize possible power down payout. You can do this from your wallet easily and the wallet displays how many days you have left until the next payout.
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