Vendor neutral comparison
Paid RPC providers for Ethereum and Layer 2s
Side by side comparison of 10 paid RPC providers — supported chains, free tier, pricing model, features, and the workload each one is best for. Use this to pair the right provider with your dapp before you commit to a monthly bill.
Looking for Solana instead? Solana is not an EVM chain, so it gets its own comparison: best Solana RPC providers.
Providers at a glance
| Provider | Chains tracked | Free tier | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alchemy Supernode RPC plus enhanced APIs across 40+ chains. | 13 | 30M compute units per month on the Free plan. | Production dapps that want enhanced APIs and analytics in one bundle. |
| Infura ConsenSys backed RPC, deeply integrated with MetaMask. | 12 | 6M credits per day, ~2,000 credits per second throughput. | Teams already standardised on ConsenSys tooling and MetaMask flows. |
| QuickNode Globally distributed RPC across 50+ chains. | 16 | Seven day free trial with full feature access. | Multi chain dapps that need consistent latency across regions. |
| Ankr Public RPC for 80+ chains plus a Premium tier. | 18 | Free public endpoints (rate limited) for 80+ chains, no signup required. | Wallets and aggregators that need a wide fallback RPC list. |
| GetBlock Shared and dedicated nodes across 50+ chains. | 16 | Free plan with a daily request cap shared across chains. | Mixed EVM and non EVM workloads on a single bill. |
| BlockPI Pay as you go RPC with no monthly minimums. | 14 | Free public endpoints per chain with shared rate limits. | Solo builders and seed stage teams that want paid reliability without a retainer. |
| Chainstack Region selectable elastic and dedicated nodes. | 15 | Free Developer plan with 3M requests per month. | Teams with latency or compliance constraints tied to specific regions. |
| Tenderly RPC with first class simulation and debugging. | 15 | Free plan with simulator access and a small RPC quota. | Smart contract teams that need simulation and revert debugging, not just RPC. |
| dRPC Decentralised RPC across 100+ chains. | 17 | Free public endpoints per chain plus a generous metered free tier. | Teams that want diversification across independent node operators. |
| NodeReal MegaNode RPC with deep BNB Chain support. | 14 | Free plan with 3M compute units per day. | Teams whose primary chain is BNB Smart Chain. |
Public RPC vs paid RPC — which should I use?
Short answer: use the public RPC for development and as a fallback. Use a paid RPC for production read traffic, write traffic from a server, indexers, and trading systems. Public endpoints rate limit eth_getLogs and trace methods, do not guarantee archive history, and have no SLA. Paid endpoints add observability, archive depth, websockets, and predictable throughput.
Chains covered on this site
Every chain page has a dedicated "Paid RPC providers" section that lists which providers support that chain and links back here.
- EthereumChain ID 1
- Arbitrum OneChain ID 42161
- OP MainnetChain ID 10
- BaseChain ID 8453
- Polygon PoSChain ID 137
- BNB Smart ChainChain ID 56
- Avalanche C-ChainChain ID 43114
- LineaChain ID 59144
- ZKsync EraChain ID 324
- ScrollChain ID 534352
- Polygon zkEVMChain ID 1101
- BlastChain ID 81457
- MantleChain ID 5000
- SonicChain ID 146
- CeloChain ID 42220
- Gnosis ChainChain ID 100
- Sei EVMChain ID 1329
- Cosmos Hubcosmoshub-4
- Osmosisosmosis-1
- Junojuno-1
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a public RPC and a paid RPC?
Public RPCs are free, shared, and rate limited. Paid RPCs from providers like Alchemy, Infura, QuickNode, and Chainstack give you a private API key, higher throughput, archive history, websockets, and SLA backed availability. Use public for development, paid for production.
Which RPC provider has the most supported chains?
Among the providers tracked here, Ankr lists 80+ chains via its free public catalog, dRPC supports 100+ via its decentralised marketplace, and QuickNode supports 50+ across EVM and non EVM. Alchemy and Infura focus on Ethereum and major Layer 2s with deeper enhanced API coverage per chain.
Do I need a paid RPC for an indexer?
Yes. Indexers issue heavy eth_getLogs and trace calls that public endpoints rate limit aggressively. Pick a provider with archive history and trace methods enabled — Chainstack, QuickNode, and Tenderly are common choices.