# firedancer-io/firedancer

Firedancer is Jump Crypto's Solana validator software.

Repository: https://github.com/firedancer-io/firedancer
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/firedancer
Homepage: https://docs.firedancer.io
Language: C
License: NOASSERTION
License Family: other
Topics: solana, c
Last push: 2026-08-26T19:34:05+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 95/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:39:23.370411+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 87, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 1478, "days_push": 7, "days_rel": 8, "gap_med": 7.0, "n_releases_24m": 75}
- flags: no_license
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1510, forks 515 (observed 2026-08-28T04:04:55.725524+00:00)

## What it is
Firedancer is Jump Crypto's from-scratch Solana validator client written in C, designed for extreme performance and security with a restrictive sandbox architecture. It ships as two validators built from the same codebase: Frankendancer (a hybrid with Agave, available on testnet and mainnet-beta) and full Firedancer (still in development, no releases).

## Use cases
- run a Solana validator node
- operate a high-performance Solana block producer
- improve Solana client diversity
- run a local Solana development cluster
- join Solana testnet with a custom validator
- reduce supply chain risk with an independent validator client

## When to choose
- you operate a Solana validator and want better performance while leader
- you want to contribute to Solana client diversity and resilience
- you need a sandboxed validator with minimal system calls
- you want to run a local dev cluster for Solana testing

## When to avoid
- you need a full from-scratch Firedancer validator in production (not yet released)
- you need a validator on non-Linux platforms (Linux kernel >= 4.18 required)
- you want a simple plug-and-play node without heavy hardware (256GB+ RAM recommended)
- you prefer a Rust-based validator like Agave

## Facets
- artifact type: application
- maturity: active
- function: networking, concurrency, security, cryptography
- domain: blockchain, microservices, performance, infrastructure-as-code
- platform: cpp, rust
- tags: solana, validator, blockchain-node, high-performance, frankendancer, client-diversity, cryptocurrency, linux

## Member repositories
- firedancer-io/firedancer (main) score 95

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:55.725524+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T04:32:25.469249+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/firedancer-io/firedancer (fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:55.725524+00:00, sha c95e281b1932)
  - homepage: https://docs.firedancer.io (fetched 2026-08-29T11:36:25.306872+00:00, sha 71e483ef22d8)
  - site_page: https://docs.firedancer.io/guide/getting-started.html (fetched 2026-08-29T11:36:25.315803+00:00, sha ebf93edc2c13)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.