Solana RPC Node Hardware Requirements (2025 Guide)

Solana is built for high-throughput, low-latency transaction processing. If you're deploying an RPC node on mainnet, hardware isn't just a consideration; it's a determining factor for reliability, performance, and ecosystem alignment. This guide walks you through the exact server specs needed to run a production grade Solana RPC node in 2025.

Why Hardware Matters for Solana RPC Performance

Solana RPC nodes carry an intense workload. They handle signature verification, ledger indexing, transaction simulation, and large volumes of concurrent requests. Any performance bottleneck can lead to dropped connections, failed responses, or your node falling behind and being delisted from critical relays.

If you're serving RPC traffic for wallets, DeFi platforms, trading bots, or MEV infrastructure, sub-millisecond latency, high read/write throughput, and deterministic performance are essential. Having the right physical hardware is key.

Recommended CPU: AMD Gen 4 / Gen 5 (Single Socket)

Dual-socket setups are surprisingly suboptimal for Solana RPC. The workload heavily depends on cache coherency, core-to-core communication, and memory latency, all of which scale better on a single, high-performance chip.

The best processors for this use case are:

AMD EPYC "F" Series. These offer high clock speeds with excellent L3 cache capacity, purpose-built for demanding workloads.

Gen4 F‑series models:

AMD EPYC 9174F – 16C / 32T @ 4.10–4.40 GHz

AMD EPYC 9274F – 24C / 48T @ 4.05–4.30 GHz

AMD EPYC 9374F – 32C / 64T @ 3.85–4.30 GHz

AMD EPYC 9474F – 48C / 96T @ 3.60–4.10 GHz

Gen 5 F-Series models:

AMD EPYC 9275F 24C / 48T @ 4.10 GHz-4.80 GHz

AMD EPYC 9375F 32C / 64T @ 3.80 GHz-4.80 GHz

AMD EPYC 9475F 48C / 96T @ 3.65 GHz-4.80 GHz

AMD EPYC 9575F 64C / 128T @ 3.30 GHz-5.00 GHz

Threadripper Pro 7000 WX-Series. Often overlooked, Threadrippers offer high clock speeds and up to 64 cores in a single socket, making them ideal for Solana RPC and indexing hybrid nodes.

AMD Threadripper PRO 7965WX 24 C / 48 T @ 4.20 GHz-5.30 GHz

AMD Threadripper PRO 7975WX 32 C / 64 T @ 4.00 GHz-5.30 GHz

Memory Requirements (RAM)

Memory is one of the easiest choke points for Solana nodes. With snapshots, replays, and account loading under heavy usage, your node can easily consume hundreds of gigabytes of RAM.

For production RPC use:

• 512GB is the absolute minimum.

• 1TB is strongly recommended to provide enough headroom for spike scenarios, especially if you run additional tools like indexers or monitoring agents.

Stick with ECC DDR5 and avoid oversubscribed memory configurations. Solana is memory-fragmentation sensitive, so monitoring swap and heap fragmentation is critical.

Disk Layout: Use Three Dedicated NVMe Drives

Combining account and ledger data on a single disk is not recommended. Solana reads and writes from these volumes in very different patterns. Separation ensures that heavy ledger writes don't interfere with fast account reads.

Here's how to partition your storage:

OS - 250GB NVMe (Light usage)

Accounts - 2TB NVMe (High IOPS, latency-sensitive)

Ledger - 4TB NVMe (Write-heavy, sequential workload)

Choose enterprise-grade drives such as Micron 7450/7500.

Here are some Gen5 storage solutions that have been tested and proven effective for running Solana validator and RPC nodes.

kioxia cm7-v

micron 9550 max

solidigm d7 - PS1010

samsung PM1743

Consumer NVMe drives (like WD SN850 or Samsung 980 Pro) degrade quickly under Solana's sustained workload and can cause node stalls or database corruption.

Network Bandwidth and Throughput

Solana RPC nodes handle a massive amount of client traffic. Latency, jitter, and packet loss directly translate into missed slots, broken WebSocket subscriptions, and user-facing errors.

While 1Gbps NICs are serviceable for testnet and basic applications, serious mainnet workloads benefit from:

• 10Gbps uplinks

Solana Double Zero Project: A New Internet for Blockchain Infrastructure

Jito Block Engine Proximity

If you integrate with the Jito Client for MEV strategies, latency to the Jito block engine relays becomes critical. A well-placed server can see block headers faster and gain an edge in transaction ordering.

Here are the current mainnet relay endpoints for Jito:

Amsterdam amsterdam.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://amsterdam.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.amsterdam.jito.wtf

Frankfurt frankfurt.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://frankfurt.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.frankfurt.jito.wtf

London london.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://london.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.london.jito.wtf

New York ny.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://ny.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.dallas.jito.wtf

Salt Lake City slc.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://slc.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.slc.jito.wtf

Singapore singapore.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://singapore.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.singapore.jito.wtf

Tokyo tokyo.mainnet.block-engine.jito.wtf http://tokyo.mainnet.relayer.jito.wtf:8100 ntp.tokyo.jito.wtf

You should aim to deploy your RPC node in the same data center or city where Jito servers are located. The main goal is to achieve latency below 1ms, which is critical for optimal MEV performance and transaction propagation.

Additional Tuning Recommendations

To ensure maximum consistency and reliability under real-world conditions:

• Disable SMT: On AMD EPYC and Threadripper CPUs, SMT can lead to cache thrashing. Disabling improves single-threaded determinism.

• Pin Threads: Use tools like taskset, numactl, or systemd affinity to isolate Solana threads from background OS processes.

• Tune I/O scheduler: For NVMe drives, none or mq-deadline often yields best results.

• Enable Hugepages: Improves performance for memory-mapped ledger operations.

• Watch Temperature and Throttling: Enterprise NVMe drives can silently throttle under sustained write load.

Final Thoughts

Solana RPC nodes aren't like Ethereum archive nodes or low-load Bitcoin daemons. They're high frequency, low latency beasts that demand optimized hardware and aggressive tuning. Whether you're running a private RPC for your app, building on top of Jito, or providing infrastructure for a DeFi platform, choosing the right system architecture is the difference between stability and failure.

Make sure your setup checks these boxes:

• High clock, single-socket AMD CPU

• 512GB–1TB of ECC DDR5 RAM

• Three dedicated NVMe disks

• 10Gbps network uplink

• Close proximity to a Jito relay node

Build smart. Benchmark often. Stay tuned.

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