Build Prysm from source
Prysm can be installed on GNU/Linux, MacOS, and Arm64 using our build tool, Bazel. This page includes instructions for performing this method.
This guidance is targeted at users who are already comfortable with Bazel and staking. See our Quickstart for beginner-friendly installation instructions.
Why Bazel?
Instead of using the Go tool to build Prysm, our team relies on the Bazel build system used by major companies to manage monorepositories. Bazel provides reproducible builds and a sandboxed environment that ensures everyone building Prysm has the same experience and can build our entire project from a single command. For more detailed rationale on why Bazel, how it works in Prysm, and all important information about how exactly building from source works, read our rationale here.
Review system requirements
| Minimum | Recommended |
|---|---|
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Dependencies
- Bazelisk this will automatically manage the version of Bazel required.
- The
cmakepackage installed - The
gitpackage installed libssl-devinstalledlibgmp-devinstalledlibtinfo5installedlibprotocversion 3.14 installed
Install Bazel using Bazelisk
Bazelisk is a launcher for Bazel which automatically downloads and installs an appropriate version of Bazel. Use Bazelisk to automatically manage the version of Bazel required.
You can install Bazelisk in multiple ways, including:
- Using a binary release for Linux, macOS, or Windows
- Using npm:
npm install -g @bazel/bazelisk - Using Homebrew on macOS:
brew install bazelisk - By compiling from source using Go:
go install github.com/bazelbuild/bazelisk@latest
Install Prysm using Bazel
Clone Prysm's main repository. Make sure you switch to the latest version (the latest version number can be found from the releases page). Once cloned, enter the directory:
git clone https://github.com/prysmaticlabs/prysm
cd prysm
git checkout <version>
Build both the beacon chain node and the validator client:
bazel build //cmd/beacon-chain:beacon-chain --config=release
bazel build //cmd/validator:validator --config=release
Bazel will automatically pull and install any dependencies as well, including Go and necessary compilers.
Run an execution node
Not familiar with nodes, networks, and related terminology? Consider reading Nodes and networks before proceeding.
To run a beacon node, you'll need access to an execution node. See Configure an execution node for detailed instructions if you don't already have an execution node configured.
Run a beacon node
Note: <YOUR_ETH_EXECUTION_NODE_ENDPOINT> is in the format of an http endpoint such as http://host:port (ex: http://localhost:8545 for geth) or an IPC path such as /path/to/geth.ipc.
- Operating system:
- Linux, MacOS, Arm64
- Windows
- Network:
- Mainnet
- Sepolia
- Holesky
Run a validator
Ensure that your beacon node is fully synced before proceeding. See Check node and validator status for detailed status-checking instructions.
Navigate to the Mainnet Launchpad and follow the instructions. If you want to participate in the testnet, you can navigate to the Holesky.
The correct address for the launchpad is https://launchpad.ethereum.org and the only, official validator deposit contract is 0x00000000219ab540356cbb839cbe05303d7705fa. Don't send ETH directly to the contract - use the Ethereum.org launchpad instead.
Throughout the process, you'll be asked to generate new validator credentials using the official Ethereum deposit command-line-tool here. Make sure you use the mainnet option when generating keys with the deposit CLI. During the process, you will have generated a validator_keys folder under the eth2.0-deposit-cli directory. Copy the path to the validator_keys folder under the eth2.0-deposit-cli directory you created during the launchpad process. For example, if your eth2.0-deposit-cli installation is in your $HOME (or %LOCALAPPDATA% on Windows) directory, you can then run the following command to import your keys:
bazel run //cmd/validator:validator -- accounts import --keys-dir=$HOME/eth2.0-deposit-cli/validator_keys --accept-terms-of-use
Next, open a second terminal window and issue the followimg command to start your validator.
bazel run //cmd/validator --config=release
Wait for your validator assignment
Please note it will take time for nodes in the network to process a deposit. To understand the timeline of becoming a validator and how long it takes on average, see this knowledge base. In the meantime, leave both terminal windows open and running; once the validator is activated by the ETH2 network, it will immediately begin receiving tasks and performing its responsibilities. If the eth2 chain has not yet started, the validator will be ready to start proposing blocks and signing votes as soon as the genesis time is reached.
To check on the status of your validator, we recommend checking out the popular block explorers: beaconcha.in by Bitfly and beaconscan.com by the Etherscan team.
Advanced: Build Docker images from source
We use Bazel to build the Docker images for Prysm as well. This section outlines comprehensive instructions on how to build them by yourself, run them in Docker, and push to an image registry if desired. In particular, we use bazel rules docker which provides us the ability to specify a base, barebones image, and essentially builds our binary and creates a Docker container as a simple wrapper over our binaries.
We do not write our own Dockerfiles, as Bazel provides us a more sandboxed, simple experience with all of its benefits. To see an example use of bazel rules docker for how we build a particular package, see here.
Dependencies needed
- All specified dependencies for building with Bazel here
- Python installed and available in your computer
Build process
Regular Docker images
At the moment, building Prysm docker images is only supported on Linux and MacOS operating systems.
The standard images are very thin wrappers around the Prysm beacon-chain and validator binaries, and do not contain any other typical components of Docker images such as a bash shell. These are the Docker images we ship to all users, and you can build them yourself by creating a docker tarball and then importing it into your local docker machine as follows:
For AMD / x86 architecture
# Beacon node
bazel build //cmd/beacon-chain:oci_image_tarball --config=release
docker load -i bazel-bin/cmd/beacon-chain/oci_image_tarball/tarball.tar
# Validator client
bazel build //cmd/validator:oci_image_tarball --config=release
docker load -i bazel-bin/cmd/validator/oci_image_tarball/tarball.tar
For ARM architecture (including Apple M1/M2/M3)
# Beacon node
bazel build //cmd/beacon-chain:oci_image_tarball --platforms=@io_bazel_rules_go//go/toolchain:linux_arm64_cgo --config=release
docker load -i bazel-bin/cmd/beacon-chain/oci_image_tarball/tarball.tar
# Validator client
bazel build //cmd/validator:oci_image_tarball --platforms=@io_bazel_rules_go//go/toolchain:linux_arm64_cgo --config=release
docker load -i bazel-bin/cmd/validator/oci_image_tarball/tarball.tar
The tags for the images are specified here. The default image tags for these images are:
gcr.io/prysmaticlabs/prysm/beacon-chain:latest
gcr.io/prysmaticlabs/prysm/validator:latest
You can edit these in the links above to your liking.
Running images
You can load the images into your local Docker daemon by first building a .tar file as follows for your desired image bundle:
bazel build //cmd/beacon-chain:oci_image_tarball --config=release
bazel build //cmd/validator:oci_image_tarball --config=release
Then, you can load it into Docker with:
docker load -i bazel-bin/cmd/beacon-chain/oci_image_tarball/tarball.tar
For example, you may see output such as this:
docker load -i bazel-bin/cmd/beacon-chain/oci_image_tarball/tarball.tar
54ad2ec71039: Loading layer [==================================================>] 103.7kB/103.7kB
6fbdf253bbc2: Loading layer [==================================================>] 21.2kB/21.2kB
7bea6b893187: Loading layer [==================================================>] 716.5kB/716.5kB
ff5700ec5418: Loading layer [==================================================>] 317B/317B
d52f02c6501c: Loading layer [==================================================>] 198B/198B
e624a5370eca: Loading layer [==================================================>] 113B/113B
1a73b54f556b: Loading layer [==================================================>] 385B/385B
d2d7ec0f6756: Loading layer [==================================================>] 355B/355B
4cb10dd2545b: Loading layer [==================================================>] 130.6kB/130.6kB
f33e343848bd: Loading layer [==================================================>] 5.846MB/5.846MB
714f56238fb5: Loading layer [==================================================>] 2.063MB/2.063MB
c8beeff22ce7: Loading layer [==================================================>] 968.6kB/968.6kB
bb0331ba4692: Loading layer [==================================================>] 131.2kB/131.2kB
dcecd3d0367d: Loading layer [==================================================>] 741.3kB/741.3kB
5bf213caca44: Loading layer [==================================================>] 52.43kB/52.43kB
15ae1a71094f: Loading layer [==================================================>] 237B/237B
8100be62255a: Loading layer [==================================================>] 2.944MB/2.944MB
613cf7104c89: Loading layer [==================================================>] 380.1kB/380.1kB
53797c1406d2: Loading layer [==================================================>] 7.856MB/7.856MB
a9df51aa7dad: Loading layer [==================================================>] 35.52kB/35.52kB
964a1c4d70ad: Loading layer [==================================================>] 24.31kB/24.31kB
467f01356216: Loading layer [==================================================>] 109.5kB/109.5kB
95ea3e93204b: Loading layer [==================================================>] 318.6kB/318.6kB
17eb06822adc: Loading layer [==================================================>] 40.37MB/40.37MB
Loaded image: gcr.io/prysmaticlabs/prysm/beacon-chain:latest
Pushing to a container registry
Authentication
You can use these rules to access private images using standard Docker authentication methods. e.g. to utilize the Google Container Registry. See here for authentication methods.
See:
Push
To push the actual images, you do not need to build the image bundle beforehand. You can do a simple:
bazel run //cmd/beacon-chain:push_images --config=release -- --tag latest --repository gcr.io/prysmaticlabs/prysm/beacon-chain
bazel run //cmd/validator:push_images --config=release -- --tag latest --repository gcr.io/prysmaticlabs/prysm/beacon-chain
Which will deploy all images with the tags specified in here for the beacon-chain and here for the validator.
By default, this will deploy to Prysmatic Labs' Google Container Registry namespace: gcr.io/prysmaticlabs/prysm, which you will not have authentication access to, so make sure you edit the image tags to your appropriate registry and authenticate as needed.