What Is Validator in Solana?
A validator is a node running Solana’s validator software (Agave or Firedancer) that participates in consensus by voting on blocks. Validators with enough delegated stake may also be selected as leaders to produce blocks during assigned slots.
Validators vs RPC nodes
Both run the same software, but they serve different roles. A validator stakes SOL, votes on blocks, and earns rewards. An RPC node does not stake or vote — it serves API requests from developers and applications. A single node can do both, but in practice operators usually separate them for performance.
Stake and leader selection
Validators are assigned leader slots proportional to their active stake. A validator with 1% of total stake produces roughly 1% of the blocks. The leader schedule is determined at the start of each epoch based on the stake distribution at that point.
Voting
Validators vote on every block they observe. Votes are on-chain transactions that cost a small fee. Vote history determines the validator’s uptime, skip rate, and earned rewards. The getVoteAccounts RPC method returns the current validator set with their vote accounts and stake.
FAQ
How much SOL do I need to run a validator? There is no minimum stake to run a validator, but earning meaningful rewards requires attracting delegated stake. The hardware requirements are significant: at least 256 GB RAM, 12-core CPU, and fast NVMe storage (as of 2026-10-20).
What is skip rate? The percentage of assigned leader slots where the validator failed to produce a block. A high skip rate reduces rewards and indicates poor performance or connectivity.
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