Ethereum Holds the Top Spot for Relays, with 21% Growth

Happy weekend everyone! We’re back with another Relay Recap.Relays were up slightly compared to last week, with the high point coming on the first day of this period. After a dip over the next three days of relays, we saw the daily numbers climb back up over 1 billion for the remaining three days of this timeframe.This week we also saw Ethereum gain in its proportion of total relays yet again, as it has taken the top spot from Polygon in recent weeks (holding the #1 position since November 22nd).Throughout this period, the network serviced an average of1.06 billion daily relays, with the daily high for this time period recorded at 1.23 billion on November 24th.

Overall, 7.39 billion relays were serviced during the week, representing a 4% increase over the 7.09 billion relays the prior week.

Chain Highlights

Ethereum was the highlight again this week, growing relays by 21% compared to the prior period. The chain cleared 400 million relays in the first day of this week, before dipping in the following days. Even after that dip, Ethereum has stayed steady above 300 million daily relays in the last 3 days of this timeframe. This performance helped Ethereum to gain 5% in its share of total relays (moving from 26% to 31%), and led to the chain holding down the #1 spot over Polygon.While many other chains were flat or down slightly compared to last week, FUSE was the other highlight this week. The chain grew its relays by 25%, building on a previous spike in relays on November 21st. Since then, relay traffic has been mostly maintaining, and staying steadily above 30 million daily relays.For the developers out there, remember to visit the Pocket Portal to get set up with RPC endpoints for these and other chains that Pocket Network supports!

Node Earnings

From November 24th through November 30th, Ethereum and Polygon remained the only two chains to clear 1 million in POKT earnings. Compared to prior weeks, Ethereum pulled away from Polygon a bit this week, as it pushed towards the 2 million mark. We’ve also had a new chain in the #3 spot for the last 2 weeks, with Gnosis - xDai holding that position. Gnosis - xDai is now significantly above DFKchain (the #4 ranked chain for earnings), while BSC has come out of this Top 3 list over the last couple of weeks and dropped down to #5.

In terms of average daily relays per node, the top 5 chains at the end of this time frame were:

• Polygon Mumbai
• Ethereum
• Polygon
• Gnosis - xDai
• Near

This list mirrors the Top 5 from the previous week.It’s been noteworthy to see Polygon Mumbai hold on to the top spot on this list for multiple weeks, as in the past we’ve seen testnets have a short run on this list after initially being supported, before dropping off the Top 5 as more nodes choose to service the chain. There are currently 83 nodes servicing the chain, compared to tens of thousands of nodes servicing some of the typical stand-bys on this list, so the rewards are being divided between fewer nodes and keeping Polygon Mumbai in the #1 position.It’s a similar situation for Near, which has also cracked the Top 5 for average earnings per node in consecutive weeks now. Similar to Polygon Mumbai, node runners servicing this chain have benefited from the fact that there are 112 nodes opting to do so, rather than the larger numbers we see on other top chains.

Node Infrastructure

As of November 30th, Pocket Network’s decentralized infrastructure included 25,500 active nodes across more than 20 different countries, allowing the network to provide constant uptime and resiliency while supporting dozens of different chains.This total node count was down 440 from the previous week.Note: PIP-22 and PUP-19 brought big changes to the incentives that shape Pocket’s node infrastructure, by way of introducing stake-weighted servicer rewards and increased validator rewards. We’ll likely continue seeing a consolidation of nodes, as node runners and providers combine stakes to take advantage of these incentive structures that have been rolled out in v0.9.0.

Wrap Up

• Ethereum and FUSE each grow relays by more than 20%, with Ethereum holding down the top spot over Polygon.
• Polygon Mumbai holds the #1 spot for average earnings per node, with Near also maintaining its spot in the Top 5 thanks to rewards being divided between fewer nodes.
• Overall relays grow by 4%.

Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend!