How long do crypto bull markets last?
In the two most recent completed cycles, Bitcoin took roughly 35 months to travel from its bear market bottom to its next all-time high: about December 2018 to November 2021, and about January 2015 to December 2017. That is a shade under three years in both cases, which is where the common "three year bull, one year bear" shorthand comes from.
Treat that number as a pattern, not a schedule. Three completed cycles is a tiny sample, the pattern has never been tested against a market with spot ETFs and institutional custody, and every cycle so far has produced smaller percentage gains than the one before it.
Right now
Not a bull market yetWhat the record actually shows
Bitcoin has completed roughly three full cycles with reliable price history. Each ran from a bear market low, through a multi-year climb, to a blow-off high, then into a drawdown of 70% or more.
The lows landed in early 2015, December 2018 and November 2022. The highs landed in December 2017, November 2021, and, for the current cycle, in 2024 and 2025. Measured low to high, the last two completed runs took about 35 months each. Measured high to low, the bear phases took roughly 12 to 14 months.
The rhythm is close enough to four years that people map it onto the halving, which also arrives roughly every four years. Whether that is cause or coincidence is genuinely unsettled, and the halving cycle is shown on this site as context rather than counted as a signal for exactly that reason.
Why the pattern is weaker than it looks
Three observations cannot establish a cycle. If you saw the same claim made about any other asset on a sample of three, you would dismiss it, and the honest position is that the crypto version deserves the same scepticism.
The magnitude has also decayed every time. The 2013 run produced gains that the 2017 run did not match in percentage terms, and 2021 fell short of 2017 on the same basis. A market that is larger, more liquid and more institutionally held should be expected to move less violently, which argues that past cycle shapes are a poor template for future ones.
The structure changed too. US spot ETFs began trading in January 2024, which introduced a buyer with entirely different behaviour from the retail speculators who drove earlier cycles. No prior cycle contained that, so no prior cycle is a clean comparison.
A more useful question than "how long"
Duration is the wrong thing to watch, because you only know the length of a bull market once it has ended. What you can observe is whether the conditions associated with one are true right now.
That is what this site does. It scores 15 live signals covering price trend, institutional flows, sentiment, retail attention and on-chain activity, then calls a bull market only on a strict majority. It will not tell you how long anything will last, but it will tell you, with the working shown, whether the conditions currently hold.
Frequently asked questions
How long does a crypto bull market last on average?
About three years from bear market bottom to cycle top, based on the two most recent completed cycles, which each took roughly 35 months. The sample is three cycles, so the average carries very little statistical weight.
How long do crypto bear markets last?
Historically around 12 to 14 months from the cycle top to the bottom, followed by a longer flat period of accumulation before the next advance begins. The 2018 and 2022 drawdowns both fit roughly that shape.
Does the four-year halving cycle set the length?
The timing has lined up so far, but correlation with a sample of four halvings is not proof of causation, and each cycle has produced a weaker echo than the last. This site tracks the halving as context and deliberately excludes it from the verdict, because a calendar cannot react to what the market is doing.
Are we in a bull market now?
That depends on live conditions rather than the calendar. The homepage scores 15 signals and gives a yes or no answer updated hourly, with every threshold disclosed.