Lava is a protocol coordinating traffic for the onchain world.

When users interact with dapps, they send transactions and data to blockchains. LAVA holders stake LAVA to direct traffic to the fastest, most reliable data providers available. Today, the protocol supports 40+ chains, for 1m+ daily users and thousands of dapps. Lava has generated $3.5m+ in revenue since August 2024, with chains and dapps like NEAR, Starknet, and Axelar already paying LAVA stakers and data providers $1m+.

Lava is extensive and RPC is only the initial service the network will support. Contributors can permissionlessly add new "specs" to Lava, JSON-files representing different types of data services and APIs, on any chain. We will soon add a Subsquid spec to bring fast indexing and subgraphs to Lava.

All specs are shown in our Github.

Lava creates a peer to peer marketplace between data consumers and data providers. The protocol is extensive and can extend to any type of data access service - we have started with RPC, but increasingly the protocol is expanding towards indexing and richer APIs. We are a permissionless network that can support small, medium or enterprise-size providers. 

Lava is looking for data providers - RPC providers, indexing providers, rich API providers etc - to join the network and work with us on our vision to bring 24/7 access to blockchain apps. We’d love to hear from you - you can reach out to us in Discord or @yuval_xyz on Telegram.

Of course, Lava is permissionless and you can already join the network without speaking to us. 

It’s super easy! You can follow the simple instructions in our Provider docs.

Make sure you join our Discord too, where we can help answer any questions about onboarding.

Lava is a chain and API agnostic protocol for blockchain access. The peer to peer protocol connects data consumers with data providers. 

RPC providers can join the protocol, connect directly to developers and serve RPC relays. During testnet, Lava is working with top ecosystems such as Evmos and Axelar, and these chains offer programmes to pay providers for their service.

Data providers and LAVA restakers earn rewards from incentive pools created by blockchains on Lava. All live and upcoming pools are here: pools.lavanet.xyz

Pools typically consist of the native taken of the chain e.g. NEAR, ATOM, STRK, but can also be created with stablecoins like USDC.

RPC providers serve requests from consumers via the Lava protocol. Payments with tokens are sent as transactions & settled on the Lava blockchain, a Cosmos SDK appchain. 

Validators order transactions and reach consensus over the state of the Lava blockchain. 

Note that even if the blockchain goes down, because relays are peer-to-peer, Providers can still continue serving consumers and will be able to claim payments when the chain is back up.

No! To make our service more scalable and remove barriers to entry, we have separated Validator and Provider roles.

Lava Network supports 30+ networks currently, including Ethereum, Cosmos Hub, Arbitrum, Starknet, Arbitrum, Hyperliquid, Base, Union, Movement and more.

New chains are added all the time and node providers who join early to Lava Network will be the first to know about new opportunities to serve RPC. You can see some of Lava’s supported chains in our docs and website.