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Erigon is an implementation of Ethereum (execution layer with embeddable consensus layer), on the efficiencyfrontier.

• Erigon
• System Requirements
• Sync Times
• Usage
  • Getting Started
  • Datadir structure
  • History on cheap disk
  • Erigon3 datadir size
  • Erigon3 changes from Erigon2
  • Logging
  • Modularity
  • Embedded Consensus Layer
  • Testnets
  • Block Production (PoS Validator)
  • Config Files TOML
  • Beacon Chain (Consensus Layer)
  • Caplin
    • Caplin's Usage
  • Multiple Instances / One Machine
  • Dev Chain
• Key features
  • Faster Initial Sync
  • More Efficient State Storage
  • JSON-RPC daemon
  • Grafana dashboard
• FAQ
  • Use as library
  • Default Ports and Firewalls
    • erigon ports
    • caplin ports
    • beaconAPI ports
    • shared ports
    • other ports
    • Hetzner expecting strict firewall rules
  • Run as a separate user -systemd example
  • Grab diagnostic for bug report
  • Run local devnet
  • Docker permissions error
  • Public RPC
  • RaspberryPI
  • Run all components by docker-compose
    • Optional: Setup dedicated user
    • Environment Variables
    • Run
  • How to change db pagesize
  • Erigon3 perf tricks
  • Windows
• Getting in touch
  • Reporting security issues/concerns

Important defaults: Erigon 3 is a Full Node by default. (Erigon 2 was anArchive Node by default.)Set--prune.mode to "archive" if you need an archive node or to "minimal" if you run a validator on a small disk (not allowed to change after first start).

In-depth links are marked by the microscope sign (🔬)

RAM: >=32GB,Golang >= 1.24; GCC 10+ or Clang; On Linux: kernel > v4. 64-bitarchitecture.

• ArchiveNode Ethereum Mainnet: 1.6TB (May 2025). FullNode: 1.1TB (May 2025)
• ArchiveNode Gnosis: 640GB (May 2025). FullNode: 300GB (June 2024)
• ArchiveNode Polygon Mainnet: 4.1TB (April 2024). FullNode: 2Tb (April 2024)

SSD or NVMe. Do not recommend HDD - on HDD Erigon will always stay N blocks behind chain tip, but not fall behind.Bear in mind that SSD performance deteriorates when close to capacity. CloudDrives (likegp3): Blocks Execution is slowoncloud-network-drives

🔬 More details onErigon3 datadir size

🔬 More details on what type of data storedhere

These are the approximate sync times syncing from scratch to the tip of the chain (results may vary depending on hardware and bandwidth).

Release Notes and Binaries

Build latest release (this will be suitable for most users just wanting to run a node):

git clone --branch release/<x.xx> --single-branch https://github.com/erigontech/erigon.gitcd erigonmake erigon./build/bin/erigon

Use--datadir to choose where to store data.

Use--chain=gnosis forGnosis Chain,--chain=bor-mainnet for Polygon Mainnet,and--chain=amoy for Polygon Amoy.For Gnosis Chain you need aConsensus Layer client alongsideErigon (https://docs.gnosischain.com/category/step--3---run-consensus-client).

Runningmake help will list and describe the convenience commands available in theMakefile.

1. Backup your datadir.
2. Upgrade your Erigon binary.
3. OPTIONAL: Upgrade snapshot files.
   1. Update snapshot file names. To do this either run Erigon 3.1 until the sync stage completes, or runerigon snapshots update-to-new-ver-format --datadir /your/datadir.
   2. Reset your datadir so that Erigon will sync to a newer snapshot.erigon snapshots reset --datadir /your/datadir. SeeResetting snapshots for more details.
4. Run Erigon 3.1. Your snapshots file names will be migrated automatically if you didn't do this manually. If you reset your datadir, Erigon will sync to the latest remote snapshots.

datadir            chaindata# "Recently-updated Latest State", "Recent History", "Recent Blocks"    snapshots# contains `.seg` files - it's old blocks        domain# Latest Statehistory# Historical values        idx# InvertedIndices: can search/filtering/union/intersect them - to find historical data. like eth_getLogs or trace_transaction        accessor# Additional (generated) indices of history - have "random-touch" read-pattern. They can serve only `Get` requests (no search/filters).    txpool# pending transactions. safe to remove.    nodes# p2p peers. safe to remove.    temp# used to sort data bigger than RAM. can grow to ~100gb. cleaned at startup.# There is 4 domains: account, storage, code, commitment

See thelib andcmd READMEs for more information.

If you can afford store datadir on 1 nvme-raid - great. If can't - it's possible to store history on cheap drive.

# place (or ln -s) `datadir` on slow disk. link some sub-folders to fast (low-latency) disk.# Example: what need link to fast disk to speedup executiondatadir            chaindata# link to fast disk    snapshots           domain# link to fast diskhistory           idx               accessor     temp# buffers to sort data >> RAM. sequential-buffered IO - is slow-disk-friendly# Example: how to speedup history access:#   - go step-by-step - first try store `accessor` on fast disk#   - if speed is not good enough: `idx`#   - if still not enough: `history`

# eth-mainnet - archive - Nov 2024du -hsc /erigon/chaindata15G /erigon/chaindatadu -hsc /erigon/snapshots/* 120G /erigon/snapshots/accessor300G/erigon/snapshots/domain280G/erigon/snapshots/history430G/erigon/snapshots/idx2.3T/erigon/snapshots

# bor-mainnet - archive - Nov 2024du -hsc /erigon/chaindata20G /erigon/chaindatadu -hsc /erigon/snapshots/* 360G/erigon-data/snapshots/accessor1.1T/erigon-data/snapshots/domain750G/erigon-data/snapshots/history1.5T/erigon-data/snapshots/idx4.9T/erigon/snapshots

• Initial sync doesn't re-exec from 0: downloading 99% LatestState and History
• Per-Transaction granularity of history (Erigon2 had per-block). Means:
  • Can execute 1 historical transaction - without executing it's block
  • If account X change V1->V2->V1 within 1 block (different transactions):debug_getModifiedAccountsByNumber returnit
  • Erigon3 doesn't store Logs (aka Receipts) - it always re-executing historical txn (but it's cheaper)
• Validator mode: added.--internalcl is enabled by default. to disable use--externalcl.
• Store most of data in immutable files (segments/snapshots):
  • can symlink/mount latest state to fast drive and history to cheap drive
  • chaindata is less than15gb. It's ok torm -rf chaindata. (to prevent grow: recommend--batchSize <= 1G)
• --prune flags changed: see--prune.mode (default:full, archive:archive, EIP-4444:minimal)
• Other changes:
  • ExecutionStage included many E2 stages: stage_hash_state, stage_trie, log_index, history_index, trace_index
  • Restart doesn't loose much partial progress:--sync.loop.block.limit=5_000 enabled by default

Flags:

• verbosity
• log.console.verbosity (overriding alias forverbosity)
• log.json
• log.console.json (alias forlog.json)
• log.dir.path
• log.dir.prefix
• log.dir.verbosity
• log.dir.json
• torrent.verbosity

In order to log only to the stdout/stderr the--verbosity (orlog.console.verbosity) flag can be used to supply anint value specifying the highest output log level:

  LvlCrit = 0  LvlError = 1  LvlWarn = 2  LvlInfo = 3  LvlDebug = 4  LvlTrace = 5

To set an output dir for logs to be collected on disk, please set--log.dir.path If you want to change the filenameproduced fromerigon you should also set the--log.dir.prefix flag to an alternate name. Theflag--log.dir.verbosity isalso available to control the verbosity of this logging, with the same int value as above, or the string value e.g. 'debug' or 'info'. Default verbosity is 'debug' (4), for disk logging.

Log format can be set to json by the use of the boolean flagslog.json orlog.console.json, or for the diskoutput--log.dir.json.

The torrent client in the Downloader logs tologs/torrent.log at the level specified bytorrent.verbosity or WARN, whichever is lower. Logs attorrent.verbosity or higher are also passed through to the top level Erigon dir and console loggers (which must have their own levels set low enough to log the messages in their respective handlers).

Erigon 3.1 adds the commanderigon snapshots reset. This modifies your datadir so that Erigon will sync to the latest remote snapshots on next run. You must pass--datadir. If the chain cannot be inferred from the chaindata, you must pass--chain.--local=false will prevent locally generated snapshots from also being removed. Pass--dry-run and/or--verbosity=5 for more information.

Erigon by default is "all in one binary" solution, but it's possible start TxPool as separated processes.Same true about: JSON RPC layer (RPCDaemon), p2p layer (Sentry), history download layer (Downloader), consensus.Don't start services as separated processes unless you have clear reason for it: resource limiting, scale, replace byyour own implementation, security.How to start Erigon's services as separated processes, see indocker-compose.yml.Each service has own./cmd/*/README.md file.Erigon Blog.

Built-in consensus for Ethereum Mainnet, Sepolia, Hoodi, Gnosis, Chiado.To use external Consensus Layer:--externalcl.

If you would like to give Erigon a try: a good option is to start syncing one of the public testnets, Hoodi (or Chiado).It syncs much quicker, and does not take so much disk space:

git clone https://github.com/erigontech/erigon.gitcd erigonmake erigon./build/bin/erigon --datadir=<your_datadir> --chain=hoodi --prune.mode=full

Please note the--datadir option that allows you to store Erigon files in a non-default location. Name of thedirectory--datadir does not have to match the name of the chain in--chain.

Block production is fully supported for Ethereum & Gnosis Chain. It is still experimental for Polygon.

You can set Erigon flags through a TOML configuration file with the flag--config. The flags set in theconfiguration file can be overwritten by writing the flags directly on Erigon command line

./build/bin/erigon --config ./config.toml --chain=sepolia

Assuming we havechain : "mainnet" in our configuration file, by adding--chain=sepolia allows the overwrite of theflag inside of the toml configuration file and sets the chain to sepolia

datadir ='your datadir'port =1111chain ="mainnet"http =true"private.api.addr"="localhost:9090""http.api" = ["eth","debug","net"]

Erigon can be used as an Execution Layer (EL) for Consensus Layer clients (CL). Default configuration is OK.

If your CL client is on a different device, add--authrpc.addr 0.0.0.0 (Engine API listens on localhost by default)as well as--authrpc.vhosts <CL host> where<CL host> is your source host orany.

In order to establish a secure connection between the Consensus Layer and the Execution Layer, a JWT secret key isautomatically generated.

The JWT secret key will be present in the datadir by default under the name ofjwt.hex and its path can be specifiedwith the flag--authrpc.jwtsecret.

This piece of info needs to be specified in the Consensus Layer as well in order to establish connection successfully.More information can be foundhere.

Once Erigon is running, you need to point your CL client to<erigon address>:8551,where<erigon address> is eitherlocalhost or the IP address of the device running Erigon, and also point to the JWTsecret path created by Erigon.

Caplin is a full-fledged validating Consensus Client like Prysm, Lighthouse, Teku, Nimbus and Lodestar. Its goal is:

• provide better stability
• Validation of the chain
• Stay in sync
• keep the execution of blocks on chain tip
• serve the Beacon API using a fast and compact data model alongside low CPU and memory usage.

The main reason why developed a new Consensus Layer is to experiment with the possible benefits that could come with it.For example, The Engine API does not work well with Erigon. The Engine API sends data one block at a time, which doesnot suit how Erigon works. Erigon is designed to handle many blocks simultaneously and needs to sort and process dataefficiently. Therefore, it would be better for Erigon to handle the blocks independently instead of relying on theEngine API.

Caplin is be enabled by default. to disable it and enable the Engine API, use the--externalcl flag. from that pointon, an external Consensus Layer will not be needanymore.

Caplin also has an archival mode for historical states and blocks. it can be enabled through the--caplin.archiveflag.In order to enable the caplin's Beacon API, the flag--beacon.api=<namespaces> must be added.e.g:--beacon.api=beacon,builder,config,debug,node,validator,lighthouse will enable all endpoints.Note: enabling the Beacon API will lead to a 6 GB higher RAM usage

Define 6 flags to avoid conflicts:--datadir --port --http.port --authrpc.port --torrent.port --private.api.addr.Example of multiple chains on the same machine:

# mainnet./build/bin/erigon --datadir="<your_mainnet_data_path>" --chain=mainnet --port=30303 --http.port=8545 --authrpc.port=8551 --torrent.port=42069 --private.api.addr=127.0.0.1:9090 --http --ws --http.api=eth,debug,net,trace,web3,erigon# sepolia./build/bin/erigon --datadir="<your_sepolia_data_path>" --chain=sepolia --port=30304 --http.port=8546 --authrpc.port=8552 --torrent.port=42068 --private.api.addr=127.0.0.1:9091 --http --ws --http.api=eth,debug,net,trace,web3,erigon

Quote your path if it has spaces.

🔬 Detailed explanation isDEV_CHAIN.

On good network bandwidth EthereumMainnet FullNode syncs in 3hours:OtterSync can sync

Flat KV storage. Erigon uses a key-value database and storing accounts and storage in a simple way.

🔬 See our detailed DB walkthroughhere.

Preprocessing. For some operations, Erigon uses temporary files to preprocess data before inserting it into the mainDB. That reduces write amplification and DB inserts are orders of magnitude quicker.

🔬 See our detailed ETL explanationhere.

Plain state

Single accounts/state trie. Erigon uses a single Merkle trie for both accounts and the storage.

🔬Staged Sync Readme

Most of Erigon's components (txpool, rpcdaemon, snapshots downloader, sentry, ...) can work inside Erigon and asindependent process on same Server (or another Server). Example:

make erigon rpcdaemon./build/bin/erigon --datadir=/my --http=false# To run RPCDaemon as separated process: use same `--datadir` as Erigon./build/bin/rpcdaemon --datadir=/my --http.api=eth,erigon,web3,net,debug,trace,txpool --ws

• Supported JSON-RPCcalls:eth,debug,net,web3
• increase throughput by:--rpc.batch.concurrency,--rpc.batch.limit,--db.read.concurrency
• increase throughput by disabling:--http.compression,--ws.compression

🔬 SeeRPC-Daemon docs

docker compose up prometheus grafana,detailed docs.

# please use git branch name (or commit hash). don't use git tagsgo get github.com/erigontech/erigon@maingo mod tidy

Typically, 30303 and 30304 are exposed to the internet to allow incoming peering connections. 9090 is exposed onlyinternally for rpcdaemon or other connections, (e.g. rpcdaemon -> erigon).Port 8551 (JWT authenticated) is exposed only internally forEngine API JSON-RPC queries from the Consensus Layernode.

In order to configure the ports, use:

   --caplin.discovery.addr value                                                    Address for Caplin DISCV5 protocol (default: "127.0.0.1")   --caplin.discovery.port value                                                    Port for Caplin DISCV5 protocol (default: 4000)   --caplin.discovery.tcpport value                                                 TCP Port for Caplin DISCV5 protocol (default: 4001)

Optional flags can be enabled that enable pprof or metrics (or both). Use--help with the binary for more info.

Reserved for future use:gRPC ports:9092 consensus engine,9093 snapshot downloader,9094 TxPool

0.0.0.0/8             "This" Network             RFC 1122, Section 3.2.1.310.0.0.0/8            Private-Use Networks       RFC 1918100.64.0.0/10         Carrier-Grade NAT (CGN)    RFC 6598, Section 7127.16.0.0/12         Private-Use Networks       RFC 1918169.254.0.0/16        Link Local                 RFC 3927172.16.0.0/12         Private-Use Networks       RFC 1918192.0.0.0/24          IETF Protocol Assignments  RFC 5736192.0.2.0/24          TEST-NET-1                 RFC 5737192.88.99.0/24        6to4 Relay Anycast         RFC 3068192.168.0.0/16        Private-Use Networks       RFC 1918198.18.0.0/15         Network InterconnectDevice Benchmark Testing   RFC 2544198.51.100.0/24       TEST-NET-2                 RFC 5737203.0.113.0/24        TEST-NET-3                 RFC 5737224.0.0.0/4           Multicast                  RFC 3171240.0.0.0/4           Reserved for Future Use    RFC 1112, Section 4255.255.255.255/32    Limited Broadcast          RFC 919, Section 7RFC 922, Section 7

SameinIpTables syntax

Running erigon frombuild/bin as a separate user might produce an error:

errorwhile loading shared libraries: libsilkworm_capi.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

The library needs to beinstalled for another user usingmake DIST=<path> install. You could use$HOME/erigonor/opt/erigon as the installation path, for example:

make DIST=/opt/erigon install

• Get stack trace:kill -SIGUSR1 <pid>, get trace and stop:kill -6 <pid>
• Get CPU profiling: add--pprof flag and run
  go tool pprof -png http://127.0.0.1:6060/debug/pprof/profile\?seconds\=20 > cpu.png
• Get RAM profiling: add--pprof flag and run
  go tool pprof -inuse_space -png http://127.0.0.1:6060/debug/pprof/heap > mem.png

🔬 Detailed explanation ishere.

Docker uses user erigon with UID/GID 1000 (for security reasons). You can see this user being created in the Dockerfile.Can fix by giving a host's user ownership of the folder, where the host's user UID/GID is the same as the docker's userUID/GID (1000).More detailsinpost

• --txpool.nolocals=true
• don't addadmin in--http.api list
• --http.corsdomain="*" is bad-practice: set exact hostname or IP
• protect from DOS by reducing:--rpc.batch.concurrency,--rpc.batch.limit

• prune.mode=full no longer downloads pre-merge blocks (seepartial history expiry).Now it only stores post-merge blocks data (i.e. blocks and transactions)
• To include pre-merge blocks data, use--prune.mode=blocks (all blocks data + only recent state data) or--prune.mode=archive (all data)

https://github.com/mathMakesArt/Erigon-on-RPi-4

Docker allows for building and running Erigon via containers. This alleviates the need for installing build dependenciesonto the host OS.

User UID/GID need to be synchronized between the host OS and container so files are written with correct permission.

You may wish to setup a dedicated user/group on the host OS, in which case the followingmake targets are available.

# create "erigon" usermake user_linux# ormake user_macos

There is a.env.example file in the root of the repo.

• DOCKER_UID - The UID of the docker user
• DOCKER_GID - The GID of the docker user
• XDG_DATA_HOME - The data directory which will be mounted to the docker containers

If not specified, the UID/GID will use the current user.

A good choice forXDG_DATA_HOME is to use the~erigon/.ethereum directory created by helpertargetsmake user_linux ormake user_macos.

Check permissions: In all cases,XDG_DATA_HOME (specified or default) must be writable by the user UID/GID in docker,which will be determined by theDOCKER_UID andDOCKER_GID at build time. If a build or service startup is failingdue to permissions, check that all the directories, UID, and GID controlled by these environment variables are correct.

Next command starts: Erigon on port 30303, rpcdaemon on port 8545, prometheus on port 9090, and grafana on port 3000.

## Will mount ~/.local/share/erigon to /home/erigon/.local/share/erigon inside container#make docker-compose## or## if you want to use a custom data directory# or, if you want to use different uid/gid for a dedicated user## To solve this, pass in the uid/gid parameters into the container.## DOCKER_UID: the user id# DOCKER_GID: the group id# XDG_DATA_HOME: the data directory (default: ~/.local/share)## Note: /preferred/data/folder must be read/writeable on host OS by user with UID/GID given#       if you followed above instructions## Note: uid/gid syntax below will automatically use uid/gid of running user so this syntax#       is intended to be run via the dedicated user setup earlier#DOCKER_UID=$(id -u) DOCKER_GID=$(id -g) XDG_DATA_HOME=/preferred/data/folder DOCKER_BUILDKIT=1 COMPOSE_DOCKER_CLI_BUILD=1 make docker-compose## if you want to run the docker, but you are not logged in as the $ERIGON_USER# then you'll need to adjust the syntax above to grab the correct uid/gid## To run the command via another user, use#ERIGON_USER=erigonsudo -u${ERIGON_USER} DOCKER_UID=$(id -u${ERIGON_USER}) DOCKER_GID=$(id -g${ERIGON_USER}) XDG_DATA_HOME=~${ERIGON_USER}/.ethereum DOCKER_BUILDKIT=1 COMPOSE_DOCKER_CLI_BUILD=1 make docker-compose

Makefile creates the initial directories for erigon, prometheus and grafana. The PID namespace is shared between erigonand rpcdaemon which is required to open Erigon's DB from another process (RPCDaemon local-mode).See:https://github.com/erigontech/erigon/pull/2392/files

If your docker installation requires the docker daemon to run as root (which is by default), you will need to prefixthe command above withsudo. However, it is sometimes recommended running docker (and therefore its containers) as anon-root user for security reasons. For more information about how to do this, refer tothis article.

post

• on BorMainnet may help:--sync.loop.block.limit=10_000
• on cloud-drives (good throughput, bad latency) - can enable OS's brain to pre-fetch:SNAPSHOT_MADV_RND=false
• can lock latest state in RAM - to prevent from eviction (node may face high historical RPC traffic without impactingChain-Tip perf):

vmtouch -vdlw /mnt/erigon/snapshots/domain/*btls /mnt/erigon/snapshots/domain/*.kv | parallel vmtouch -vdlw# if it failing with "can't allocate memory", try: sync && sudo sysctl vm.drop_caches=3echo 1 > /proc/sys/vm/compact_memory

Windows users may run erigon in 3 possible ways:

• Build executable binaries natively for Windows using providedwmake.ps1 PowerShell script. Usage syntax is the sameasmake command so you have to run.\wmake.ps1 [-target] <targetname>. Example:.\wmake.ps1 erigon builds erigonexecutable. All binaries are placed in.\build\bin\ subfolder. There are some requirements for a successful nativebuild on windows :

  • Git for Windows must be installed. If you're cloning this repository is verylikely you already have it
  • GO Programming Language must be installed. Minimum required version is 1.24
  • GNU CC Compiler at least version 13 (is highly suggested that you installchocolatey package manager - seefollowing point)
  • If you need to build MDBX tools (i.e..\wmake.ps1 db-tools)thenChocolatey package manager for Windows must be installed. By Chocolatey you needto install the following components :cmake,make,mingw bychoco install cmake make mingw. Make sureWindows System "Path" variable has:C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\lib\mingw\tools\install\mingw64\bin

  Important note about Anti-VirusesDuring MinGW's compiler detection phase some temporary executables are generated to test compiler capabilities. It'sbeen reported some anti-virus programs detect those files as possibly infected byWin64/Kryptic.CIS trojan horse (ora variant of it). Although those are false positives we have no control over 100+ vendors of security products forWindows and their respective detection algorithms and we understand this might make your experience with Windowsbuilds uncomfortable. To workaround the issue you might either set exclusions for your antivirus specificallyforbuild\bin\mdbx\CMakeFiles sub-folder of the cloned repo or you can run erigon using the following other twooptions

• Use Docker : seedocker-compose.yml

• Use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux)strictly on version 2. Under this option you can build Erigon just as youwould on a regular Linux distribution. You can point your data also to any of the mounted Windows partitions (eg./mnt/c/[...],/mnt/d/[...] etc) but in such case be advised performance is impacted: this is due to the factthose mount points useDrvFS which isanetwork file systemand, additionally, MDBX locks the db for exclusive access which implies only one process at a time can access data.This has consequences on the running ofrpcdaemon which has to be configured asRemote DB even ifit is executed on the very same computer. If instead your data is hosted on the native Linux filesystem nonlimitations apply.Please also note the default WSL2 environment has its own IP address which does not match the one of the networkinterface of Windows host: take this into account when configuring NAT for port 30303 on your router.

Send an email tosecurity [at] torquem.ch.