What Is Agave in Solana?
Agave is the primary Solana validator client, written in Rust and maintained by Anza (an organization spun off from Solana Labs). It is the original validator implementation that runs the majority of the Solana network.
History
The Agave codebase was originally the Solana Labs validator. In 2024, the validator team reorganized under Anza, and the project was renamed from “solana-validator” to “Agave” to distinguish it from Firedancer, a second independent validator client being built by Jump Crypto.
Client diversity
Solana is moving toward a multi-client architecture. Having multiple independent validator implementations (Agave and Firedancer) improves network resilience — a bug in one client does not affect the entire network if other clients are unaffected.
Frankendancer is a hybrid client that uses Firedancer’s networking stack with Agave’s execution layer, serving as a stepping stone toward full Firedancer adoption.
FAQ
Is Agave the same as the old Solana validator? Yes, it is the same codebase, renamed and maintained under the Anza organization.
Should I run Agave or Firedancer? Most validators run Agave (as of 2026-10-20). Firedancer is in active development and is being adopted gradually. Check the current status at the Firedancer project page.
Where is the Agave source code? The source code is at github.com/anza-xyz/agave.
Sources
Updated: