kusama-rpc.yml

# OpenChainBench. Bench № 185

slug: kusama-rpc
number: "185"
title: Fastest free Kusama RPC, live no-key endpoint latency
seo_title: "Fastest free Kusama RPC 2026"
seo_description: "{{best_name}} leads free Kusama RPC at {{best_p50}} (chain_getHeader p50, 24h). 6 no-key providers measured every 60s from 3 regions."
subtitle: HTTP round-trip latency for chain_getHeader against every free, no-key public Kusama relay-chain endpoint, audited every 60 seconds from 3 regions.

category: RPCs
status: live
metric: RPC latency
unit: ms
higher_is_better: false

seo_intro: |
  Kusama is Polkadot's canary network, a live production relay chain (KSM token) where new features ship before Polkadot mainnet. Substrate-based, ~6 s block time, same Substrate JSON-RPC wire protocol as Polkadot. Six keyless endpoints are probed continuously: PublicNode, OnFinality, dRPC, IBP Network, Dwellir, and 1RPC.

abstract: |
  Per-chain member of the RPC latency cluster, extended to Kusama.
  We measure the round-trip latency of a single, identical JSON-RPC call
  (`chain_getHeader`) against every no-key public Kusama relay-chain endpoint
  that sustains continuous probing, 6 providers at launch,
  every 60 seconds, from us-east, eu-west and Singapore. The harness
  classifies every response (ok / http_err / jsonrpc_err / stale /
  timeout) with a relay-chain-scaled staleness gap (40 blocks). The
  cross-chain view lives on the parent `rpc-capabilities` benchmark;
  this page is the Kusama-scoped answer with per-region breakdowns as a
  first-class dimension.

methodology:
  - "Cadence: every 60 seconds per provider, from each of 3 probe regions (us-east Virginia, eu-west Amsterdam, sgp Singapore). Headline p50/p90/p99 aggregate across all 3 regions via Prometheus `avg(quantile_over_time(...))`; per-region breakdowns are first-class on this page via the region tabs."
  - "Payload: `{\"jsonrpc\":\"2.0\",\"id\":<rotating>,\"method\":\"chain_getHeader\",\"params\":[]}`. Plain HTTP POST, identical for every endpoint, no API key in any request."
  - "Latency: client-side round-trip delta in milliseconds, exposed as both a gauge and a histogram (buckets 50 ms to 10 s), so percentiles are computed via Prometheus `quantile_over_time` over the last 24 hours."
  - "Call-result classification: `ok` (HTTP 200 + parsable hex block number), `http_err`, `jsonrpc_err`, `stale` (more than 40 relay blocks behind the cross-provider tip), `timeout`."
  - "This page is part of the per-chain RPC cluster derived from the cross-chain [rpc-capabilities](https://openchainbench.com/benchmarks/rpc-capabilities) benchmark; the identical harness, cadence and exclusion rules apply on every chain."
  - "Chain scope: every query on this page is pinned to `chain=\"kusama\"`. Provider coverage at launch: 6 no-key endpoints."

findings:
  - "{{best_name}} currently leads free Kusama RPC at {{best_p50}} (`chain_getHeader` p50, 24h) across 6 measured providers."

faq:
  - q: "What is the fastest free Kusama RPC right now?"
    a: "{{best_name}} currently leads at {{best_p50}} (`chain_getHeader` p50 over the last 24h), measured against 6 no-key providers probed every 60 seconds from us-east, eu-west and Singapore. The leaderboard re-sorts continuously against fresh Prometheus samples."
  - q: "Which Kusama RPCs work without an API key?"
    a: "6 endpoints sustain continuous keyless probing at launch: PublicNode, OnFinality, dRPC, IBP Network (Kusama governance-funded infra), Dwellir, and 1RPC. Every listed endpoint was live-verified before inclusion."
  - q: "Does the fastest Kusama RPC change by region?"
    a: "Often. Substrate-ecosystem infra concentrates in Europe; endpoints that win from Amsterdam can lose from Singapore. The region tabs re-scope every number to a single origin."
  - q: "How is Kusama RPC latency measured here?"
    a: "One identical Substrate JSON-RPC POST (`chain_getHeader`) every 60 seconds from each of 3 regions. Responses are classified so stale or error endpoints are never ranked as fastest."

source: https://github.com/ChainBench/OpenChainBench/tree/main/harnesses/rpc-capabilities

prometheus:
  window: 24h
  freshness_metric: rpc_latency_milliseconds

rank_matrix_query: avg by (provider, region) (ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{chain="kusama"})

dimensions:
  region:
    - { value: all,     label: All regions }
    - { value: us-east, label: US-East }
    - { value: eu-west, label: EU-West }
    - { value: sgp,     label: Singapore }

providers:
  - slug: publicnode
    name: PublicNode
    tag: Allnodes-operated multi-chain gateway including Substrate
    formula: "50th percentile over 24h of client-side round-trip latency (ms) for a single `chain_getHeader` POST sent every 60s from 3 regions to PublicNode's no-key Kusama endpoint."
    queries:
      p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"})
      p90: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p90_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"})
      p99: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p99_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"})
      mean: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:mean_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"})
      success: sum(ocb:rpc_call:ok_rate_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"}) / sum(ocb:rpc_call:rate_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"})
      sample_size: sum(ocb:rpc_call:increase_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"})
      series: avg(avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama"}[1h]))
      regions:
        - region: us-east
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama", region="us-east"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama", region="us-east"}[1h])
        - region: eu-west
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama", region="eu-west"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama", region="eu-west"}[1h])
        - region: ap-southeast
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama", region="sgp"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="publicnode", chain="kusama", region="sgp"}[1h])

  - slug: onfinality
    name: OnFinality
    tag: Substrate-native public gateway, Web3 Foundation grantee
    formula: "50th percentile over 24h of client-side round-trip latency (ms) for a single `chain_getHeader` POST sent every 60s from 3 regions to OnFinality's no-key Kusama endpoint."
    queries:
      p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"})
      p90: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p90_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"})
      p99: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p99_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"})
      mean: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:mean_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"})
      success: sum(ocb:rpc_call:ok_rate_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"}) / sum(ocb:rpc_call:rate_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"})
      sample_size: sum(ocb:rpc_call:increase_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"})
      series: avg(avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama"}[1h]))
      regions:
        - region: us-east
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama", region="us-east"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama", region="us-east"}[1h])
        - region: eu-west
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama", region="eu-west"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama", region="eu-west"}[1h])
        - region: ap-southeast
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama", region="sgp"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="onfinality", chain="kusama", region="sgp"}[1h])

  - slug: drpc
    name: dRPC
    tag: dRPC public gateway for Kusama relay chain
    formula: "50th percentile over 24h of client-side round-trip latency (ms) for a single `chain_getHeader` POST sent every 60s from 3 regions to dRPC's no-key Kusama endpoint."
    queries:
      p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"})
      p90: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p90_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"})
      p99: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p99_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"})
      mean: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:mean_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"})
      success: sum(ocb:rpc_call:ok_rate_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"}) / sum(ocb:rpc_call:rate_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"})
      sample_size: sum(ocb:rpc_call:increase_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"})
      series: avg(avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="drpc", chain="kusama"}[1h]))
      regions:
        - region: us-east
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama", region="us-east"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="drpc", chain="kusama", region="us-east"}[1h])
        - region: eu-west
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama", region="eu-west"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="drpc", chain="kusama", region="eu-west"}[1h])
        - region: ap-southeast
          p50: avg(ocb:rpc_latency_milliseconds:p50_24h{provider="drpc", chain="kusama", region="sgp"})
          series: avg_over_time(rpc_latency_milliseconds{provider="drpc", chain="kusama", region="sgp"}[1h])