Solanahcl

This is the Solana Hardware Compatibility List for running a mainnet validator.

• Baseline Hardware
• Recommended Hardware
  • CPU
    • Agave CPU
    • Frankendancer CPU
  • Storage
  • Swap
• Datacenter Providers
• FAQ
• Resources
• Contributors

Baseline Hardware

Source: https://docs.anza.xyz/operations/requirements

| Component | Validator Requirements | Additional RPC Node Requirements | |-----------|------------------------|----------------------------------| | CPU | - 2.8GHz base clock speed, or faster<br />- SHA extensions instruction support<br />- AMD Gen 3 or newer<br />- Intel Ice Lake or newer<br />- Higher clock speed is preferable over more cores<br />- AVX2 instruction support (to use official release binaries, self-compile otherwise)<br />- Support for AVX512f is helpful | | | | 12 cores / 24 threads, or more | 16 cores / 32 threads, or more | | RAM | Error Correction Code (ECC) memory is suggested<br />Motherboard with 512GB capacity suggested | | | | 256GB or more | 512 GB or more for all account indexes | | Disk | PCIe Gen3 x4 NVME SSD, or better, on each of:<br />- Accounts: 500GB, or larger. High TBW (Total Bytes Written)<br />- Ledger: 1TB or larger. High TBW suggested<br />- Snapshots: 250GB or larger. High TBW suggested<br />- OS: (Optional) 500GB, or larger. SATA OK<br /><br />The OS may be installed on the ledger disk, though testing has shown better performance with the ledger on its own disk<br /><br />Accounts and ledger can be stored on the same disk, however due to high IOPS, this is not recommended<br /><br />The Samsung 970 and 980 Pro series SSDs are popular with the validator community | Consider a larger ledger disk if longer transaction history is required<br /><br />Accounts and ledger should not be stored on the same disk | | GPUs | Not necessary at this time<br />Operators in the validator community do not use GPUs currently | |

Recommended Hardware

CPU

Agave CPU

AMD is the CPU maker of choice when it comes to running Solana validators. Running Intel processors for a new validator is strongly discouraged. Intel Xeon Gold/Platinum (6[45]xx) are the only ones known to be able to possibly keep up with the chain.

NOTE: This list is not exhaustive, just a selection of CPUs different folks on the discord have run or are currently running.

• 24 cores is the sweet spot for agave, as of 9/2025, frankendancer loves and utilizes more cores especially with revenue scheduler so 32/64 are more viable
• 12/16 cores will most likely struggle, and
• more than 32 cores will have a slower base clock speed due to TDP issues (32 cores would possibly be more future proof).

The recommendations also apply to RPC nodes, but RPC nodes require more cores and RAM than validators to perform sufficiently under load. RPC node operators should therefore aim for a slightly higher core count than validator operators.

| Recommended | Manufacturer | Model | Base Clock | Max Boost Clock | Cores | Threads | Default TDP | PoH speed * | |-------------|--------------|-------------------------------|-----------:|----------------:|------:|--------:|------------:|--------------| | Yes | AMD | Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7965WX | 4.20 GHz | Up to 5.30 GHz | 24 | 48 | 350 W | 22.2M, 20.4M | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9274F | 4.05 GHz | Up to 4.30 GHz | 24 | 48 | 320 W | 18.1M | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7975WX | 4.00 GHz | Up to 5.30 GHz | 32 | 64 | 350 W | | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7985WX | 3.20 GHz | Up to 5.10 GHz | 64 | 128 | 350 W | | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9374F | 3.85 GHz | Up to 4.30 GHz | 32 | 64 | 320 W | 18.2M | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9375F | 3.80 GHz | Up to 4.80 GHz | 32 | 64 | 320 W | | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9275F | 4.10 GHz | Up to 4.80 GHz | 24 | 48 | 320 W | 19.3M | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen Threadripper 7960X | 4.20 GHz | Up to 5.30 GHz | 24 | 48 | 350 W | 20.6M, 19.9M | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen 9 7950X | 4.50 GHz | Up to 5.70 GHz | 16 | 32 | 170 W | 22.4M | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen 9 9950X | 4.30 GHz | Up to 5.70 GHz | 16 | 32 | 170 W | 23M | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9254 | 2.90 GHz | Up to 4.15 GHz | 24 | 48 | 200 W | 17.5M | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9354P | 3.25 GHz | Up to 3.80 GHz | 32 | 64 | 280 W | 16.1M, 14.4M |

* The CPU should be capable of at least 10M hashes/sec. Results based on governor set at performance mode.

Source:

• AMD Server Processors
• AMD Workstation Processors

Frankendancer CPU

For Frankendancer its beneficial to have Simultaneous Multi-Threading (SMT) enabled. With each CPU it was tested if its possible to catch up with a non-voting node, while SMT was enabled.

| Recommended | Manufacturer | Model | Base Clock | Max Boost Clock | Cores | Threads | Default TDP | Caught up in Testnet | Caught up in Mainnet | |-------------|--------------|-------------------------------|-----------:|----------------:|------:|--------:|------------:|----------------------|----------------------| | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9575F | 3.30 GHz | Up to 4.50 GHz | 64 | 128 | 400 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9474F | 3.60 GHz | Up to 4.10 GHz | 48 | 96 | 360 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9374F | 3.85 GHz | Up to 4.30 GHz | 32 | 64 | 320 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9354P | 3.25 GHz | Up to 3.80 GHz | 32 | 64 | 280 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9354 | 3.25 GHz | Up to 3.80 GHz | 32 | 64 | 280 W | Yes, default layout | Not tested yet | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9274F | 4.05 GHz | Up to 4.30 GHz | 24 | 48 | 320 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 9254 | 2.90 GHz | Up to 4.15 GHz | 24 | 48 | 200 W | Yes, custom layout* | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 7742 | 2.25 GHz | Up to 3.40 GHz | 64 | 128 | 225 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 7513 | 2.60 GHz | Up to 3.65 GHz | 32 | 64 | 200 W | Yes, default layout | Not tested yet | | Yes | AMD | EPYC 74F3 | 3.20 GHz | Up to 4.00 GHz | 24 | 48 | 240 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen Threadripper Pro 7975WX | 4.00 GHz | Up to 5.30 GHz | 32 | 64 | 350 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | Yes | AMD | Ryzen Threadripper Pro 7965WX | 4.20 GHz | Up to 5.30 GHz | 24 | 48 | 350 W | Yes, default layout | Yes, default layout | | No | AMD | Ryzen 9 5900X | 3.70 GHz | Up to 4.80 GHz | 12 | 24 | 105 W | Yes, custom layout* | No | | No | AMD | Ryzen 9 5950X | 3.40 GHz | Up to 4.90 GHz | 16 | 32 | 105 W | Yes, default layout | - | | No | AMD | Ryzen 9 7950X | 4.50 GHz | Up to 5.70 GHz | 16 | 32 | 170 W | Yes, default layout | - |

* Tested Testnet layout for Ryzen 9 5900X: one verify tile, one bank tile and agave affinity "auto"
* Per Bored King 9254 with custom layout and disable accounts index patch

Storage

Drives are mainly recommended based on performance figures from the manufacturer. All tables are sorted by the claimed random write performance (IOPS), as this is an essential property for Solana validators.

Enterprise gen 5 (PCIe 5.0)

| Manufacturer | Model | Size | Sequential Read | Sequential Write | Random Read | Random Write | |--------------|-----------|--------:|----------------:|-----------------:|------------:|-------------:| | Phison | X200E | 6.40 TB | 14,800 MB/s | 8,700 MB/s | 3,200K IOPS | 880K IOPS | | Solidigm | D7-PS1030 | 6.40 TB | 14,500 MB/s | 10,000 MB/s | 3,000K IOPS | 800K IOPS | | SanDisk | SN861 | 6.40 TB | 13,700 MB/s | 7,500 MB/s | 3,300K IOPS | 800K IOPS | | Phison | X200E | 3.20 TB | 14,800 MB/s | 8,600 MB/s | 3,300K IOPS | 790K IOPS | | Solidigm | D7-PS1030 | 3.20 TB | 14,