General
What is a validator?
A node whose consensus key signs blocks on the Cosmos Hub and that proposes blocks in proportion to its voting power. Only the 180 validators with the most bonded ATOM are active. The rest are candidates who hold a place on chain but do not sign or earn. See What a validator does.What is staking?
Bonding ATOM to a validator. Delegators bond to a validator they trust. The validator’s voting power rises, and both earn rewards from the pool. Bonded ATOM is locked and shares in any slashing of that validator. Unbonding takes 21 days.Can a delegator lose money because of my validator?
Yes. Slashes apply to all stake bonded to the validator, delegators’ included. Downtime costs 0.01 percent. A double sign costs 5 percent and tombstones the validator. After that every delegator has to redelegate.Keys
Which keys can be rotated?
None, on gaia v28.3.1. The three keys and what happens if each is lost:- Operator key (
cosmosandcosmosvaloperaddress): cannot be changed, rotated, or replaced. Losing it means losing control of the validator. The only path is a new validator and asking delegators to move. Keep it on a Ledger or in a multisig. - Consensus key (
priv_validator_key.json,cosmosvalconsaddress): cannot be rotated on the Hub today. A leaked key means retiring the validator before someone double signs with it. Keep it in a remote signer. - Node key (
node_key.json): not rotated, regenerated. Delete it and restart. Update your sentries with the new id.
Where does each key come from?
Thegaiad keys add command creates the operator key in the keyring. The gaiad init command writes the consensus key and the node key into config/. The consensus key is not derived from the operator key or from any mnemonic. Back it up separately and encrypted.
Can I use the same consensus key on two machines for failover?
No. Two signers with one key double sign as soon as both are live. Failover needs a signer designed for it or a strict manual procedure. See Operational rules for any remote signer.Become a validator
How do I become a validator?
Sync a full node, then sendcreate-validator with a validator.json from the operator key. Follow the Validator onboarding checklist.
How much ATOM do I need?
Enough voting power to exceed the 180th validator’s. The chain sets no minimum beyond 1 uatom self-delegation, but the cutoff on Mintscan is what decides whether you sign. Delegations count toward it, so most new validators grow in from the candidate list.What is min-self-delegation?
A floor you set at creation and can only raise. If your own stake drops below it, the validator is jailed. It is also the clean exit lever: undelegate below it on purpose and the validator leaves the set without a downtime slash. See Leave the set cleanly.What are the commission rules?
At least 5 percent (min_commission_rate). The maximum rate and the maximum daily change are fixed at creation. Changes happen through edit-validator, at most once per 24 hours counting from create-validator. See Edit the validator.
Do I need a validator bond for liquid staking?
No. The Hub’s x/liquid module has two caps: 25 percent of all bonded ATOM globally and 100 percent per validator. It has no validator bond. A validator cannot refuse tokenized shares from other delegators. Thegaiad tx liquid disable-tokenize-shares message only locks the sending account’s own delegations. See Liquid staking.
States
What states can a validator be in?
- Bonded: in the top 180 by voting power, signing, earning, slashable.
- Unbonding: dropped out of the set or jailed. Stake stays locked and slashable for 21 days.
- Unbonded: outside the set with the unbonding period over. It still exists, can receive delegations, and re-enters when its power qualifies.
- Jailed: a flag on top of the above. A jailed validator cannot be in the set until the operator sends
unjailafterjailed_untilpasses. - Tombstoned: permanently jailed after a double sign. Cannot be unjailed.
Why is my voting power 0?
Either the validator is below the 180th seat, or the consensus key the node signs with is not the one registered increate-validator. See Common problems.
Responsibilities
What does the network expect from me?
Sign every block, never sign two at the same height, upgrade at every governance upgrade height, vote on proposals, keep a reachable security contact in your validator description, and run the setup in Validator security.How are upgrades coordinated?
By governance proposal with a fixed upgrade height, announced on the gaia releases page and the validator channels on the Interchain Discord. Cosmovisor swaps the binary at the height. See Upgrade with Cosmovisor.Can I run a validator from home?
You can. The downtime window is about 15 hours, and the double-sign penalty is permanent. The question is whether your connectivity, power, and hardware redundancy support that. Sentries in a data centre with the validator at home is a common compromise.Incentives
What do validators earn?
Commission on delegators’ rewards plus rewards on their own stake. Rewards come from inflation (between 7 and 10 percent a year, 10 percent on 2026-10-15) and transaction fees, less the 2 percent community tax, split by voting power. See Economics.Does the block proposer earn more?
No. Bothbase_proposer_reward and bonus_proposer_reward are 0 on the Hub, so the proposer receives the same share as every other validator with the same power.
What are the fees paid in?
Inuatom, at or above the fee market’s current minimum (0.005 uatom per gas on 2026-10-15; gaiad query feemarket gas-prices).
Slashing
What gets a validator slashed?
- Downtime: signing fewer than 5 percent of the last 10,000 blocks. The penalty is a 0.01 percent slash and a 10-minute jail, then
unjail. - Double sign: two different signatures at the same height and round on the same chain. The penalty is a 5 percent slash and tombstone.
How long before downtime jails me?
About 15 hours at the block time measured on 2026-10-15 (9,500 missed blocks at 5.7 seconds each). Alert on missed blocks within minutes. See Monitoring.Can a tombstoned validator come back?
No. Create a new validator with a new consensus key and a new operator key, and ask delegators to redelegate.Is my validator also at risk from other chains?
Not through consensus. Gaia v28 removed the Interchain Security provider module, so the Hub no longer secures consumer chains. There is no cross-chain slashing. If you also validate other chains, each is a separate validator with its own keys.Technical
What hardware do I need?
See Hardware and system requirements. Fast NVMe storage with room to grow matters more than CPU count.What is a sentry node?
A full node you run in front of the validator so the validator has no public address. See Sentry topology.What is a remote signer and do I need one?
A separate process that holds the consensus key and signs on the node’s request, so the key is not on the validator host. Any serious mainnet validator should run one. See Remote signing.Which remote signers are supported?
Cosmos KMS is the signer maintained under the Cosmos organisation. TMKMS and Horcrux are external and not maintained by Cosmos. Horcrux’s repository is archived. Status lines and a disclosure are on the Remote signing page.Can I use a Ledger for the validator?
For the operator key, yes:gaiad keys add <name> --ledger. See Ledger. The consensus key belongs in a remote signer or hardware security module (HSM), not a Ledger wallet.
How do I stop the node at a specific height?
Rungaiad config set app halt-height <height>, or start with gaiad start --halt-height <height>. See Stop at a height.