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Becoming a Vault Operator

A StakeWise Vault → is a highly customizable, non-custodial staking pool — a smart contract that pools ETH from depositors and stakes it through validators to secure the Ethereum network and earn rewards. Vaults come in several variants: standard, private, blocklist, ERC20, and Meta Vaults. Together, they form an ecosystem of isolated self-contained pools, each with its own validators, fees, node operators, and depositors.

Operating a Vault is straightforward. A Vault is created via the StakeWise UI, and all staking logic is enforced by immutable smart contracts on-chain. The Operator Service ↗ — open-source software developed by StakeWise — runs alongside the operator's node infrastructure as an automation layer, handling the validator lifecycle, withdrawals, and state updates, while the Vault contract verifies and approves every transaction.

A Vault's responsibilities can be split across roles — from admin control and fee claiming to validator management. Each role can be assigned to a different address, and node operations can be handled by a separate entity entirely. For the full role breakdown, see Management Roles →.

Why Operate a Vault?​

Vaults open the doors for diverse staking use cases:

  • Stake for yourself — Run your own validators, keep 100% of rewards, and allow your depositors to stay liquid by minting osETH →.
  • Offer staking to others — Accept deposits and earn fees, or launch a white-label staking product powered by StakeWise infrastructure ↗.
  • Institutional or DAO treasury staking — Configure compliance controls, restrict access with whitelists or blocklists, and enable or disable tokenization as needed.
  • Scale with Meta Vaults — Delegate assets across multiple sub-vaults without running validators directly, unlocking advanced staking strategies.

What Can I Earn?​

Vault fees → — a configurable percentage of staking rewards, paid automatically in Vault shares when the Vault state is updated. Operators set their fee freely at Vault creation (up to 100%). After launch, fee increases are rate-limited to 20% of the current fee every 3 days, protecting depositors from sudden hikes. Earned fees can be claimed and distributed to shareholders without manual intervention (see Fee Claiming → for details).

IconExample

A Vault with 1,000 ETH staked at ~3.5% APY and a 5% fee earns approximately 1.75 ETH/year in operator fees. At 10,000 ETH, that becomes 17.5 ETH/year.

MEV rewards — Choose between the Smoothing Pool (rewards shared across participating Vaults proportional to their size, more consistent) or Own MEV Escrow (your Vault keeps all its MEV, higher upside but more variable). See MEV Strategy →.

What Are the Costs?​

Your costs depend on whether you run your own node or delegate operations to a third party. If you run the node yourself:

  • Infrastructure — Hardware requirements are an ever-evolving target. As of March 2026, running a node requires a dedicated machine with at least 64 GB, a 4TB SSD, and a stable internet connection. You can use a pre-built staking hardware (from ~€2,000 for plug-and-play devices such as Home x StakeWise Pro ↗) or a cloud server if you don't want to deal with building and maintaining your own physical computer.
  • Gas — The Operator Service submits on-chain transactions (validator registrations, funding, consolidations, exits, withdrawals, state updates) funded from your operator wallet. Gas costs are minimal during normal network conditions and fluctuate with congestion. Check the Ethereum Gas Tracker ↗ for current rates.

If you delegate node operations to a third party, your costs will change based on your arrangement with the service provider.

What Are the Responsibilities?​

Running a node is a commitment. Here's what you need to take care of. If you delegate node operations to a third party, you remain responsible for your Vault's performance — how that responsibility is shared depends on your arrangement with the provider.

  • Install and configure the Operator Service — required software that automates validator registrations, withdrawals, and state updates.
  • Set up execution and consensus clients — Install and configure following the official documentation of your chosen clients. For a faster start, the Operator Service includes built-in commands to automatically install and manage Reth (execution) and Lighthouse (consensus) clients. See Automated Node Setup →.
  • Set up MEV-Boost ↗ — Capture execution layer rewards. If your Vault uses the Smoothing Pool, you must use one of the StakeWise DAO-approved MEV relays (see Smoothing Pool Relays →).
  • Generate and import validator keys — Validator keystores can be generated using the Operator Service or tools like Wagyu Key Gen ↗, and must be imported into the validator client before validators activate. The validators will be registered automatically via the Operator Service.
  • Fund your operator wallet — Ensure it has enough ETH for gas.
  • Keep your nodes and validators running — To maximize your rewards, you need to keep your validator online and up to date. Uptime directly affects your Vault's performance score →.
  • Secure your infrastructure — Restrict access to your node endpoints (e.g., firewall) and protect your keys and mnemonic.
  • Monitor performance — Track attestation and proposal metrics. Prometheus and Grafana help you visualize important real-time metrics about your validator.

Who Operates Vaults Today​

Vault operators range from solo stakers running a single private Vault to professional node operators and institutions managing thousands of ETH. StakeWise infrastructure powers staking products for partners like MetaMask ↗ and Chorus One ↗.

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