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Staking Solana (SOL) FAQs

Everything you need to know about staking Solana (SOL) in Exodus.

In this article:

What is Solana staking and how can I benefit from it?

Staking your Solana is a great way to earn passive income in the form of staking rewards. Rewards are paid out in SOL. 

With Solana, staking means you agree to lock up an amount of SOL that you choose for a period of time, during which it is unspendable. However, your SOL never leaves your wallet, and you can unstake your SOL whenever you choose. You will only have to wait for a few epochs to send or exchange your funds.

By staking your SOL, you actively support the Solana network by allocating resources to it and contributing to the stability of the network. In return for your support, you earn SOL as a reward!

What actually happens when I stake my SOL?

When staking your SOL, what you are really doing is delegating an amount of it to a so-called “validator.” This makes you a “delegator.” The Solana validators validate and approve transactions on the Solana blockchain. 

The more SOL that is delegated to a validator, the more transactions it gets to validate and the more powerful it becomes. By delegating your tokens to the validator, you basically “vote” for and signal your trust in it.

The more transactions a validator validates, the more money it earns. From this income, it gives back to all the people who delegated (staked) their SOL to it. This is how you earn rewards.

Is staking Solana safe?

Staking your SOL is done in a non-custodial way in Exodus. That means that it is as safe as simply holding SOL in your wallet. You keep full control over your tokens while they are staked, and you’re free to unstake your funds whenever you choose.

So instead of letting your SOL sit idly in your wallet, you might as well put it to good use and let it earn rewards for you! To start staking SOL, you can download any version of Exodus.

How does staking work?

When you stake your SOL, you are able to choose how much of your SOL you want to delegate to the validator. You can stake any amount of Solana over the 0.01 SOL minimum reserve. While you are staking, you will only be able to perform transactions with any unstaked amount of SOL inside your wallet over the minimum reserve.

Staking doesn’t take effect immediately. When you stake your SOL, you will need to wait for several epochs to start earning rewards.

Both staking and unstaking take effect at epoch boundaries. An epoch is approximately equivalent to 2-4 days, but the time it takes for your SOL to finish staking and unstaking depends on where in the epoch you stake or unstake, how long the epoch lasts, and the warmup or cooldown period.

Are Solana addresses case-sensitive?

Yes, Solana addresses are case-sensitive.

This means that if even one character of the address is changed from uppercase to lowercase, or vice versa, it will be a different Solana address.

It’s a good practice copy and paste your Solana address rather than type it in. Always double-check that an address is correct before sending your funds.

How do I stake my SOL inside of Exodus?

Mobile

First, in Mobile, open your Solana wallet, then tap the Stake icon.

Tap on Stake SOL.

To start staking your Solana, ea) nter the amount of SOL you want to stake, and b) tap on Stake SOL.

Desktop

Open up Desktop and head over to the Rewards app.

Navigate to where it says Solana and then click on Start Earning.

Enter the amount of SOL you want to stake and click on Stake SOL.

You will need more than 0.01 SOL as a minimum reserve to start staking.

Web3 Wallet

Open Web3 Wallet and a) click the Wallet icon, then b) click on your Solana wallet.

Click the Rewards icon.

Click Stake SOL.

On the Earn Solana screen, a) enter the amount of SOL you want to stake, then b) click Stake SOL.

Your Exodus wallet will initiate staking your SOL. This may take a few minutes to complete.

Your wallet will then let you know that your Solana is staked. To exit, click OK.

When you stake your Solana, you will need to wait for several epochs (approx. 4-8 days) to start generating rewards.

When you stake your SOL, you will need to wait for several epochs (approx. 4-8 days) before it starts earning rewards.

How does unstaking work?

When you decide to unstake your SOL inside of Exodus, you can only unstake all of your currently staked balance. Your funds may take several epochs to become available for use again.

Unstaking your SOL will cost a transaction fee of 0.000005 SOL which will be deducted from your minimum reserve.

After unstaking your SOL, all you need to do is wait for your Exodus wallet to automatically withdraw the balance. This process allows your staked balance (plus any rewards) to become usable again inside your Exodus wallet. Once it is complete, you can then send or exchange your SOL!

What is the 0.01 SOL minimum reserve?

Solana allows addresses to be active on the network by paying rent. This rent is needed in order to maintain the information of your address on the Solana network.

Rent is usually paid to the network automatically from your Solana balance. However, you can have a rent exception, which means you do not need to pay rent to the Solana network to use your SOL.

To be exempted from rent, you will need to ensure that your Solana address locks away an amount of SOL equivalent to 2 years of rent in a minimum reserve. The current minimum reserve is 0.01 SOL

You can find more information about rent in the Solana docs here: Rent

What are warmup and cooldown periods?

There is a limit on how much total stake can become delegated (staked) or deactivated (unstaked) in a single epoch, to prevent large sudden changes in stake across the network as a whole. 

Because of this, there are warmup and cooldown periods that extend the time before staking and unstaking complete. Since warmup and cooldown are dependent on the behavior of other network participants, their exact duration is difficult to predict.

Stakes, once delegated, do not become effective immediately. They must first pass through a warmup period. During this period some portion of the stake is considered “effective,” while the rest is considered “activating.” Changes occur on epoch boundaries.

The amount of stake that can be warmed up each epoch is a function of the previous epoch’s total effective stake, total activating stake, and the stake program’s configured warmup rate.

Cooldown works the same way. Once a stake is deactivated, part of it is considered “effective”, and part “deactivating”. As the stake cools down, it continues to earn rewards, and then, it becomes available for withdrawal.

Rewards are paid against the “effective” portion of the stake for that epoch.

For more detailed information, including examples of how this works, you can visit Solana’s official documentation here.

How do I check the current epoch progress?

If you would like to see the amount of time remaining in an epoch, you can visit Solana Explorer and look at the value in Epoch time remaining (approx.)

Which validator will I be delegating my funds to?

When you stake your SOL inside of Exodus, you will be supporting our staking API provider Everstake.

How much can I earn from staking my SOL?

To find out more about what Annual Percentage Yield (APY) is and how to view the current APY for SOL, please check out this article: What is APY?

You can find the latest yield for staking Solana (SOL) on Everstake’s website here.

By staking your SOL, you actively support the Solana network by allocating resources to it and contributing to the stability of the network. In return for your support, you earn SOL as a reward!

Does Exodus charge a fee to stake my SOL?

No, Exodus does not charge a fee! There are a few Solana network fees:

Staking fees:

  • A transaction fee for sending the delegation transaction when you stake your SOL

Unstaking fees:

  • An “unstake” transaction fee when you decide to unstake your SOL
  • A “withdraw” transaction fee to move your SOL from your staking address to your regular address

What is the minimum amount I need to start staking?

Any amount over 0.01 SOL is required to start staking as there is a 0.01 SOL minimum reserve. The minimum balance of 0.01 Sol cannot be staked

When will I start earning rewards?

When you decide to stake your Solana, you will need to initially wait for 2 epochs (where 1 epoch is roughly equivalent to 2-4 days) to start generating rewards. This means that if you start staking your SOL in epoch 100, then you will start earning rewards on the effective amount in epoch 102.

Your rewards are distributed every epoch after that.

Any additional SOL that you stake after will also need to wait for 2 epochs before earning rewards on the effective amount.

Do I need to claim my Solana rewards?

No! Your rewards are automatically claimed for you and added to your staked balance so you can automatically earn more rewards!

As a condition of the Solana network, If you want access to your rewards balance, then you will need to unstake all of your SOL and withdraw it to your wallet.

Exodus is not affiliated with any third-party platforms, external links, or any other third-party resources mentioned in this article. As such, Exodus cannot guarantee the performance of third-party products or services, or that the steps shown and the information provided will always be accurate.

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