Running a Base Node

For production apps requiring reliable, unlimited RPC access.

Security

• Restrict RPC access — bind to 127.0.0.1 or a private interface, never expose RPC ports (8545/8546) to the public internet without authentication
• Firewall rules — only open ports 9222 (Discovery v5) and 30303 (P2P) to the public; block all other inbound traffic
• Run as a non-root user with minimal filesystem permissions
• Use TLS termination (reverse proxy with nginx/caddy) if exposing the RPC endpoint to remote clients
• Monitor for unauthorized access — log and alert on unexpected RPC calls or connection spikes

Hardware Requirements

• CPU: 8-Core minimum
• RAM: 16 GB minimum
• Storage: NVMe SSD, formula: (2 × chain_size) + snapshot_size + 20% buffer

Networking

Required Ports:

• Port 9222: Critical for Reth Discovery v5
• Port 30303: P2P Discovery & RLPx

If these ports are blocked, the node will have difficulty finding peers and syncing.

Client Selection

Use Reth for Base nodes. Geth Archive Nodes are no longer supported.

Reth provides:

• Better performance for high-throughput L2
• Built-in archive node support

Syncing

• Initial sync takes days
• Consumes significant RPC quota if using external providers
• Use snapshots to accelerate (check Base docs for URLs)

Sync Status

Incomplete sync indicator: Error: nonce has already been used when deploying.

Verify sync:

• Compare latest block with explorer
• Check peer connections
• Monitor logs for progress