Introduction to Optimum
Your validators can only attest to a block after it reaches your beacon node. When the block arrives late, attestations miss or vote on the wrong head. When you propose, the MEV-Boost bid cutoff sets how long you wait for a better bid. If you wait too long, your block is late. If you cut off too early, you leave value behind.
Optimum works on both.
What Optimum is
mump2p is Optimum's peer-to-peer mesh. It propagates blocks using network coding: peers send coded pieces of a block and rebuild it from whichever pieces arrive first, instead of waiting for a full copy. See mump2p protocol for the details.
You join the mesh by running the Optimum gateway, one container on a host beside your beacon node.
The gateway is a peer of your consensus client. It passes blocks to the client and never receives validator keys. Your validator client, keys, and signing setup stay exactly as they are.
What you get
| What it does | Where you see it | |
|---|---|---|
| Signal | The gateway hands your beacon node blocks from the mesh, so your validators receive blocks sooner. That improves attestation performance. | Signal in Console, then the Network report |
| Accelerate | Reads the slots your validators already proposed and recommends a MEV-Boost bid cutoff. You download the config and deploy it yourself. For entity accounts. | Accelerate in Console, then its proposal report |
Console never changes your infrastructure. Optimum does not host gateways. You run the gateway and apply any configuration yourself.
Who it is for
- Staking providers and other entities. Run a gateway beside each beacon node, register your validator indices so Console can measure the result, then use Accelerate on your proposals.
- Individuals who run validators. Signal works the same way for you. Accelerate is offered to entity accounts only. Account type.
- Participants without validators. Run a stream-only gateway to receive blocks from the mesh and serve them to your own consumers. This is a supported account.
The path
- Start here. How the pieces fit, which path is yours, and what the host needs.
- Getting in. Create a Console account and register your organisation.
- Signal. Start the gateway, peer your consensus client, verify it, and register your validator indices.
- Accelerate. For entity accounts. Once enough of your proposals are measured, read the cutoff recommendation and adjust MEV-Boost.
Already running a gateway? The versioned manual (every setting, metric, and log line) is the gateway reference.