Chain Configs

Some chains allow the node operator to provide a custom configuration. AvalancheGo can read chain configurations from files and pass them to the corresponding chains on initialization.

AvalancheGo looks for these files in the directory specified by --chain-config-dir AvalancheGo flag, as documented here. If omitted, value defaults to $HOME/.avalanchego/configs/chains. This directory can have sub-directories whose names are chain IDs or chain aliases. Each sub-directory contains the configuration for the chain specified in the directory name. Each sub-directory should contain a file named config, whose value is passed in when the corresponding chain is initialized (see below for extension). For example, config for the C-Chain should be at: {chain-config-dir}/C/config.json.

This also applies to Subnets, for example, if a Subnet's chain id is 2ebCneCbwthjQ1rYT41nhd7M76Hc6YmosMAQrTFhBq8qeqh6tt, the config for this chain should be at {chain-config-dir}/2ebCneCbwthjQ1rYT41nhd7M76Hc6YmosMAQrTFhBq8qeqh6tt/config.json

tip

By default, none of these directories and/or files exist. You would need to create them manually if needed.

The filename extension that these files should have, and the contents of these files, is VM-dependent. For example, some chains may expect config.txt while others expect config.json. If multiple files are provided with the same name but different extensions (for example config.json and config.txt) in the same sub-directory, AvalancheGo will exit with an error.

For a given chain, AvalancheGo will follow the sequence below to look for its config file, where all folder and file names are case sensitive:

• First it looks for a config sub-directory whose name is the chain ID - If it isn't found, it looks for a config sub-directory whose name is the chain's primary alias - If it's not found, it looks for a config sub-directory whose name is another alias for the chain

Alternatively, for some setups it might be more convenient to provide config entirely via the command line. For that, you can use AvalancheGo --chain-config-content flag, as documented here.

It is not required to provide these custom configurations. If they are not provided, a VM-specific default config will be used. And the values of these default config are printed when the node starts.

C-Chain Configs

In order to specify a config for the C-Chain, a JSON config file should be placed at {chain-config-dir}/C/config.json. This file does not exist by default.

For example if chain-config-dir has the default value which is $HOME/.avalanchego/configs/chains, then config.json should be placed at $HOME/.avalanchego/configs/chains/C/config.json.

The C-Chain config is printed out in the log when a node starts. Default values for each config flag are specified below.

Default values are overridden only if specified in the given config file. It is recommended to only provide values which are different from the default, as that makes the config more resilient to future default changes. Otherwise, if defaults change, your node will remain with the old values, which might adversely affect your node operation.

State Sync

state-sync-enabled (boolean)

Set to true to start the chain with state sync enabled. The peer will download chain state from peers up to a recent block near tip, then proceed with normal bootstrapping.

Defaults to perform state sync if starting a new node from scratch. However, if running with an existing database it will default to false and not perform state sync on subsequent runs.

Please note that if you need historical data, state sync isn't the right option. However, it is sufficient if you are just running a validator.

state-sync-skip-resume (boolean)

If set to true, the chain will not resume a previously started state sync operation that did not complete. Normally, the chain should be able to resume state syncing without any issue. Defaults to false.

state-sync-min-blocks (int)

Minimum number of blocks the chain should be ahead of the local node to prefer state syncing over bootstrapping. If the node's database is already close to the chain's tip, bootstrapping is more efficient. Defaults to 300000.

state-sync-ids (string)

Comma separated list of node IDs (prefixed with NodeID-) to fetch state sync data from. An example setting of this field would be --state-sync-ids="NodeID-7Xhw2mDxuDS44j42TCB6U5579esbSt3Lg,NodeID-MFrZFVCXPv5iCn6M9K6XduxGTYp891xXZ". If not specified (or empty), peers are selected at random. Defaults to empty string ("").

state-sync-server-trie-cache (int)

Size of trie cache used for providing state sync data to peers in MBs. Should be a multiple of 64. Defaults to 64.

Continuous Profiling

continuous-profiler-dir (string)

Enables the continuous profiler (captures a CPU/Memory/Lock profile at a specified interval). Defaults to "". If a non-empty string is provided, it enables the continuous profiler and specifies the directory to place the profiles in.

continuous-profiler-frequency (duration)

Specifies the frequency to run the continuous profiler. Defaults 900000000000 nano seconds which is 15 minutes.

continuous-profiler-max-files (int)

Specifies the maximum number of profiles to keep before removing the oldest. Defaults to 5.

Enabling Avalanche Specific APIs

snowman-api-enabled (boolean)

Enables the Snowman API. Defaults to false.

coreth-admin-api-enabled (boolean)

Enables the Admin API. Defaults to false.

coreth-admin-api-dir (string)

Specifies the directory for the Admin API to use to store CPU/Mem/Lock Profiles. Defaults to "".

Enabling EVM APIs

eth-apis ([]string)

Use the eth-apis field to specify the exact set of below services to enable on your node. If this field is not set, then the default list will be: ["eth","eth-filter","net","web3","internal-eth","internal-blockchain","internal-transaction"].

note

The names used in this configuration flag have been updated in Coreth v0.8.14. The previous names containing public- and private- are deprecated. While the current version continues to accept deprecated values, they may not be supported in future updates and updating to the new values is recommended.

The mapping of deprecated values and their updated equivalent follows:

Deprecated	Use instead
public-eth	eth
public-eth-filter	eth-filter
private-admin	admin
private-debug	debug
public-debug	debug
internal-public-eth	internal-eth
internal-public-blockchain	internal-blockchain
internal-public-transaction-pool	internal-transaction
internal-public-tx-pool	internal-tx-pool
internal-public-debug	internal-debug
internal-private-debug	internal-debug
internal-public-account	internal-account
internal-private-personal	internal-personal

note

If you populate this field, it will override the defaults so you must include every service you wish to enable.

eth

The API name public-eth is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to eth.

Adds the following RPC calls to the eth_* namespace. Defaults to true.

eth_coinbase eth_etherbase

eth-filter

The API name public-eth-filter is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to eth-filter.

Enables the public filter API for the eth_* namespace. Defaults to true.

Adds the following RPC calls (see here for complete documentation):

• eth_newPendingTransactionFilter
• eth_newPendingTransactions
• eth_newAcceptedTransactions
• eth_newBlockFilter
• eth_newHeads
• eth_logs
• eth_newFilter
• eth_getLogs
• eth_uninstallFilter
• eth_getFilterLogs
• eth_getFilterChanges

admin

The API name private-admin is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to admin.

Adds the following RPC calls to the admin_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• admin_importChain
• admin_exportChain

debug

The API names private-debug and public-debug are deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under these names have been migrated to debug.

Adds the following RPC calls to the debug_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• debug_dumpBlock
• debug_accountRange
• debug_preimage
• debug_getBadBlocks
• debug_storageRangeAt
• debug_getModifiedAccountsByNumber
• debug_getModifiedAccountsByHash
• debug_getAccessibleState

net

Adds the following RPC calls to the net_* namespace. Defaults to true.

• net_listening
• net_peerCount
• net_version

Note: Coreth is a virtual machine and does not have direct access to the networking layer, so net_listening always returns true and net_peerCount always returns 0. For accurate metrics on the network layer, users should use the AvalancheGo APIs.

debug-tracer

Adds the following RPC calls to the debug_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• debug_traceChain
• debug_traceBlockByNumber
• debug_traceBlockByHash
• debug_traceBlock
• debug_traceBadBlock
• debug_intermediateRoots
• debug_traceTransaction
• debug_traceCall

web3

Adds the following RPC calls to the web3_* namespace. Defaults to true.

• web3_clientVersion
• web3_sha3

internal-eth

The API name internal-public-eth is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to internal-eth.

Adds the following RPC calls to the eth_* namespace. Defaults to true.

• eth_gasPrice
• eth_baseFee
• eth_maxPriorityFeePerGas
• eth_feeHistory

internal-blockchain

The API name internal-public-blockchain is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to internal-blockchain.

Adds the following RPC calls to the eth_* namespace. Defaults to true.

• eth_chainId
• eth_blockNumber
• eth_getBalance
• eth_getAssetBalance
• eth_getProof
• eth_getHeaderByNumber
• eth_getHeaderByHash
• eth_getBlockByNumber
• eth_getBlockByHash
• eth_getUncleBlockByNumberAndIndex
• eth_getUncleBlockByBlockHashAndIndex
• eth_getUncleCountByBlockNumber
• eth_getUncleCountByBlockHash
• eth_getCode
• eth_getStorageAt
• eth_call
• eth_estimateGas
• eth_createAccessList

internal-transaction

The API name internal-public-transaction-pool is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to internal-transaction.

Adds the following RPC calls to the eth_* namespace. Defaults to true.

• eth_getBlockTransactionCountByNumber
• eth_getBlockTransactionCountByHash
• eth_getTransactionByBlockNumberAndIndex
• eth_getTransactionByBlockHashAndIndex
• eth_getRawTransactionByBlockNumberAndIndex
• eth_getRawTransactionByBlockHashAndIndex
• eth_getTransactionCount
• eth_getTransactionByHash
• eth_getRawTransactionByHash
• eth_getTransactionReceipt
• eth_sendTransaction
• eth_fillTransaction
• eth_sendRawTransaction
• eth_sign
• eth_signTransaction
• eth_pendingTransactions
• eth_resend

internal-tx-pool

The API name internal-public-tx-pool is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to internal-tx-pool.

Adds the following RPC calls to the txpool_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• txpool_content
• txpool_contentFrom
• txpool_status
• txpool_inspect

internal-debug

The API names internal-private-debug and internal-public-debug are deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under these names have been migrated to internal-debug.

Adds the following RPC calls to the debug_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• debug_getHeaderRlp
• debug_getBlockRlp
• debug_printBlock
• debug_chaindbProperty
• debug_chaindbCompact

debug-handler

Adds the following RPC calls to the debug_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• debug_verbosity
• debug_vmodule
• debug_backtraceAt
• debug_memStats
• debug_gcStats
• debug_blockProfile
• debug_setBlockProfileRate
• debug_writeBlockProfile
• debug_mutexProfile
• debug_setMutexProfileFraction
• debug_writeMutexProfile
• debug_writeMemProfile
• debug_stacks
• debug_freeOSMemory
• debug_setGCPercent

internal-account

The API name internal-public-account is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to internal-account.

Adds the following RPC calls to the eth_* namespace. Defaults to true.

• eth_accounts

internal-personal

The API name internal-private-personal is deprecated as of v1.7.15, and the APIs previously under this name have been migrated to internal-personal.

Adds the following RPC calls to the personal_* namespace. Defaults to false.

• personal_listAccounts
• personal_listWallets
• personal_openWallet
• personal_deriveAccount
• personal_newAccount
• personal_importRawKey
• personal_unlockAccount
• personal_lockAccount
• personal_sendTransaction
• personal_signTransaction
• personal_sign
• personal_ecRecover
• personal_signAndSendTransaction
• personal_initializeWallet
• personal_unpair

API Configuration

rpc-gas-cap (int)

The maximum gas to be consumed by an RPC Call (used in eth_estimateGas and eth_call). Defaults to 50,000,000.

rpc-tx-fee-cap (int)

Global transaction fee (price * gaslimit) cap (measured in AVAX) for send-transaction variants. Defaults to 100.

api-max-duration (duration)

Maximum API call duration. If API calls exceed this duration, they will time out. Defaults to 0 (no maximum).

api-max-blocks-per-request (int)

Maximum number of blocks to serve per getLogs request. Defaults to 0 (no maximum).

ws-cpu-refill-rate (duration)

The refill rate specifies the maximum amount of CPU time to allot a single connection per second. Defaults to no maximum (0).

ws-cpu-max-stored (duration)

Specifies the maximum amount of CPU time that can be stored for a single WS connection. Defaults to no maximum (0).

allow-unfinalized-queries (boolean)

Allows queries for unfinalized (not yet accepted) blocks/transactions. Defaults to false.

accepted-cache-size `(int)

Specifies the depth to keep accepted headers and accepted logs in the cache. This is particularly useful to improve the performance of eth_getLogs for recent logs.

Transaction Pool

local-txs-enabled (boolean)

Enables local transaction handling (prioritizes transactions submitted through this node). Defaults to false.

allow-unprotected-txs (boolean)

If true, the APIs will allow transactions that are not replay protected (EIP-155) to be issued through this node. Defaults to false.

allow-unprotected-tx-hashes ([]TxHash)

Specifies an array of transaction hashes that should be allowed to bypass replay protection. This flag is intended for node operators that want to explicitly allow specific transactions to be issued through their API. Defaults to an empty list.

remote-tx-gossip-only-enabled (boolean)

If true, the node will only gossip remote transactions to prevent transactions issued through this node from being broadcast to the network. Defaults to false.

tx-regossip-frequency (duration)

Amount of time that should elapse before we attempt to re-gossip a transaction that was already gossiped once. Defaults to 60000000000 nano seconds which is 1 minute.

tx-regossip-max-size (int)

Maximum number of transactions to re-gossip at once. Defaults to 15.

tx-pool-journal (string)

Specifies file path to a transaction journal to store local transactions that survive between node restarts.

Defaults to empty string and being disabled. To enable transaction pool journaling, the user must specify a non-empty journal and enable local transactions via local-txs-enabled.

tx-pool-rejournal (duration)

Time interval to regenerate the local transaction journal. Defaults to 1 hour.

tx-pool-price-limit (int)

Minimum gas price to enforce for acceptance into the pool. Defaults to 1 wei.

tx-pool-price-bump (int)

Minimum price bump percentage to replace an already existing transaction (nonce). Defaults to 10%.

tx-pool-account-slots (int)

Number of executable transaction slots guaranteed per account. Defaults to 16.

tx-pool-global-slots (int)

Maximum number of executable transaction slots for all accounts. Defaults to 5120.

tx-pool-account-queue (int)

Maximum number of non-executable transaction slots permitted per account. Defaults to 64.

tx-pool-global-queue (int)

Maximum number of non-executable transaction slots for all accounts. Defaults to 1024.

Metrics

metrics-enabled (boolean)

Enables metrics. Defaults to false.

metrics-expensive-enabled (boolean)

Enables expensive metrics. Defaults to false.

Snapshots

snapshot-async (boolean)

If true, allows snapshot generation to be executed asynchronously. Defaults to true.

snapshot-verification-enabled (boolean)

If true, verifies the complete snapshot after it has been generated. Defaults to false.

Logging

log-level (string)

Defines the log level for the chain. Must be one of "trace", "debug", "info", "warn", "error", "crit". Defaults to "info".

log-json-format (bool)

If true, changes logs to JSON format. Defaults to false.

Keystore Settings

keystore-directory (string)

The directory that contains private keys. Can be given as a relative path. If empty, uses a temporary directory at coreth-keystore. Defaults to the empty string ("").

keystore-external-signer (string)

Specifies an external URI for a clef-type signer. Defaults to the empty string ("" as not enabled).

keystore-insecure-unlock-allowed (bool)

If true, allow users to unlock accounts in unsafe HTTP environment. Defaults to false.

Database

trie-clean-cache (int)

Size of cache used for clean trie nodes (in MBs). Should be a multiple of 64. Defaults to 512.

trie-dirty-cache (int)

Size of cache used for dirty trie nodes (in MBs). When the dirty nodes exceed this limit, they are written to disk. Defaults to 256.

trie-dirty-commit-target (int)

Memory limit to target in the dirty cache before performing a commit (in MBs). Defaults to 20.

snapshot-cache (int)

Size of the snapshot disk layer clean cache (in MBs). Should be a multiple of 64. Defaults to 256.

trie-clean-journal (string)

Directory to use to save the trie clean cache (must be populated to enable journaling the trie clean cache). Empty and disabled by default.

trie-clean-rejournal (duration)

Frequency to re-journal the trie clean cache to disk (minimum 1 minute, must be populated to enable journaling the trie clean cache).

acceptor-queue-limit (int)

Specifies the maximum number of blocks to queue during block acceptance before blocking on Accept. Defaults to 64.

commit-interval (int)

Specifies the commit interval at which to persist the merkle trie to disk. Defaults to 4096.

pruning-enabled (boolean)

If true, database pruning of obsolete historical data will be enabled. This reduces the amount of data written to disk, but does not delete any state that is written to the disk previously. This flag should be set to false for nodes that need access to all data at historical roots. Pruning will be done only for new data. Defaults to false in v1.4.9, and true in subsequent versions.

note

If a node is ever run with pruning-enabled as false (archival mode), setting pruning-enabled to true will result in a warning and the node will shut down. This is to protect against unintentional misconfigurations of an archival node.

To override this and switch to pruning mode, in addition to pruning-enabled: true, allow-missing-tries should be set to true as well.

populate-missing-tries (*uint64)

If non-nil, sets the starting point for repopulating missing tries to re-generate archival merkle forest.

To restore an archival merkle forest that has been corrupted (missing trie nodes for a section of the blockchain), specify the starting point of the last block on disk, where the full trie was available at that block to re-process blocks from that height onwards and re-generate the archival merkle forest on startup. This flag should be used once to re-generate the archival merkle forest and should be removed from the config after completion. This flag will cause the node to delay starting up while it re-processes old blocks.

populate-missing-tries-parallelism (int)

Number of concurrent readers to use when re-populating missing tries on startup. Defaults to 1024.

allow-missing-tries (boolean)

If true, allows a node that was once configured as archival to switch to pruning mode. Defaults to false.

preimages-enabled (boolean)

If true, enables preimages. Defaults to false.

offline-pruning-enabled (boolean)

If true, offline pruning will run on startup and block until it completes (approximately one hour on Mainnet). This will reduce the size of the database by deleting old trie nodes. While performing offline pruning, your node will not be able to process blocks and will be considered offline. While ongoing, the pruning process consumes a small amount of additional disk space (for deletion markers and the bloom filter). For more information see here.

Since offline pruning deletes old state data, this should not be run on nodes that need to support archival API requests.

This is meant to be run manually, so after running with this flag once, it must be toggled back to false before running the node again. Therefore, you should run with this flag set to true and then set it to false on the subsequent run.

offline-pruning-bloom-filter-size (int)

This flag sets the size of the bloom filter to use in offline pruning (denominated in MB and defaulting to 512 MB). The bloom filter is kept in memory for efficient checks during pruning and is also written to disk to allow pruning to resume without re-generating the bloom filter.

The active state is added to the bloom filter before iterating the DB to find trie nodes that can be safely deleted, any trie nodes not in the bloom filter are considered safe for deletion. The size of the bloom filter may impact its false positive rate, which can impact the results of offline pruning. This is an advanced parameter that has been tuned to 512 MB and should not be changed without thoughtful consideration.

offline-pruning-data-directory (string)

This flag must be set when offline pruning is enabled and sets the directory that offline pruning will use to write its bloom filter to disk. This directory should not be changed in between runs until offline pruning has completed.

tx-lookup-limit (uint64)

Number of recent blocks for which to maintain transaction lookup indices in the database. If set to 0, transaction lookup indices will be maintained for all blocks. Defaults to 0.

VM Networking

max-outbound-active-requests (int)

Specifies the maximum number of outbound VM2VM requests in flight at once. Defaults to 16.

max-outbound-active-cross-chain-requests (int)

Specifies the maximum number of outbound cross-chain requests in flight at once. Defaults to 64.

Miscellaneous

airdrop (string)

Path to a json file that contains a list of addresses for a genesis airdrop. Each address will be airdropped AirdropAmount at genesis, and the hash of the airdrop file must match AirdropHash. AirdropAmount and AirdropHash are part of the genesis config. This option applies to subnet-evm only (not applicable to coreth).

skip-upgrade-check (bool)

If set to true, the chain will skip verifying that all expected network upgrades have taken place before the last accepted block on startup. This allows node operators to recover if their node has accepted blocks after a network upgrade with a version of the code prior to the upgrade. Defaults to false.

X-Chain Configs

In order to specify a config for the X-Chain, a JSON config file should be placed at {chain-config-dir}/X/config.json.

For example if chain-config-dir has the default value which is $HOME/.avalanchego/configs/chains, then config.json can be placed at $HOME/.avalanchego/configs/chains/X/config.json.

This allows you to specify a config to be passed into the X-Chain. The default values for this config are:

{
  "index-transactions": false,
  "index-allow-incomplete": false
}

Default values are overridden only if explicitly specified in the config.

The parameters are as follows:

Transaction Indexing

index-transactions (boolean)

Enables AVM transaction indexing if set to true. Default value is false. When set to true, AVM transactions are indexed against the address and assetID involved. This data is available via avm.getAddressTxs API.

note

If index-transactions is set to true, it must always be set to true for the node's lifetime. If set to false after having been set to true, the node will refuse to start unless index-allow-incomplete is also set to true (see below).

index-allow-incomplete (boolean)

Allows incomplete indices. Default value is false.

This config value is ignored if there is no X-Chain indexed data in the DB and index-transactions is set to false.

Subnet Chain Configs

As mentioned above, if a Subnet's chain id is 2ebCneCbwthjQ1rYT41nhd7M76Hc6YmosMAQrTFhBq8qeqh6tt, the config for this chain should be at {chain-config-dir}/2ebCneCbwthjQ1rYT41nhd7M76Hc6YmosMAQrTFhBq8qeqh6tt/config.json

FAQ

• When using getBlockNumber it will return finalized blocks. To allow for queries for unfinalized (not yet accepted) blocks/transactions use allow-unfainalized-queries and set to true (by default it is set to false)

• When deactivating offline pruning (pruning-enabled: false) from previously enabled state, this will not impact blocks whose state was already pruned. This will return missing trie node errors, as the node can't lookup the state of a historical block if that state was deleted.