Staking MON — Rewards, Validators & Liquid Staking
Complete guide to staking MON on Monad — how to delegate, validator requirements, ~12-15% APR, liquid staking protocols (sMON, aprMON, shMON, gMON), and unstaking.
Overview
Monad uses delegated Proof of Stake (dPoS) via MonadBFT consensus. MON holders can delegate their tokens to validators to earn staking rewards without giving up custody. The current staking APR is approximately 12-15%, varying by validator.
How to Stake
Option 1: Validator platforms — professional staking providers offer dedicated dashboards:
- Figment (figment.io), P2P.org, Everstake, Chorus One, Kiln
- Coinbase Earn — stake directly from Coinbase
Option 2: Wallet-based staking — some wallets support direct delegation:
- Atomic Wallet, Gem Wallet
Option 3: Liquid staking — stake and keep liquidity (see below):
- Kintsu (sMON), aPriori (aprMON), Fastlane (shMON), Magma (gMON)
General steps for any platform:
- Hold MON in an EVM-compatible wallet (MetaMask, Phantom, etc.)
- Connect your wallet to the staking platform of your choice
- Select a validator from the list
- Enter the amount of MON to delegate
- Approve the transaction — your MON remains in your custody
No Minimum for Delegators
There is no strict minimum stake for delegators. You only need enough MON to make the delegation meaningful and cover the gas fee.
Staking Rewards
- Block reward: 25 MON per block, distributed proportionally to the block leader's delegators
- Priority fees: User-paid priority fees that validators can share with delegators
- Commission: Validators take a commission (typically ~10%) before distributing rewards
- Current APR: ~12-15% depending on validator commission and uptime
- Rewards do not auto-compound — you must manually claim or use the compound action
Validators
The active validator set consists of the top 200 validators by total stake (self-stake + delegations), recalculated each epoch.
| Requirement | Value |
|---|---|
| Minimum self-stake | 100,000 MON |
| Minimum total stake (active set) | 10,000,000 MON |
| Active set size | Top 200 by stake weight |
| Hardware | Bare metal, 16-core CPU, 32GB RAM, 2TB NVMe |
| Typical commission | ~10% |
Major validator operators include Figment, P2P.org, Everstake, Coinbase, Chorus One, Kiln, and Nansen.
Bare Metal Only
Monad validators must run on bare metal hardware — cloud instances (AWS, GCP, Azure) are not supported due to strict timing requirements of MonadBFT.
Liquid Staking
Four liquid staking protocols let you stake MON while keeping liquidity for DeFi:
| Protocol | Token | Key Feature |
|---|---|---|
| Kintsu | sMON | DeFi composability — use sMON across lending, DEXs, yield |
| aPriori | aprMON | MEV revenue redistribution — yields above native staking APR |
| Fastlane | shMON | MEV-aware with gas abstraction (Atlas framework) |
| Magma | gMON | DAO-owned, Distributed Validator Technology (DVT) |
Unstaking & Epochs
- Epoch length: 50,000 blocks (~5.5 hours)
- Unstaking delay: 1 full epoch (6-12 hours depending on timing)
- Process: Initiate unstake → wait 1 epoch → explicitly withdraw to available balance
- This is significantly faster than Ethereum (~8 days) or Cosmos (21 days)
Track Your Staking
Use Monad AI Explorer to monitor any wallet's MON balance and staking activity. Paste a validator or delegator address to see full transaction history, or ask the AI assistant: "What are the staking rewards for this address?"