§ Wiki · Wiki entry

Node Provider Roadmap

The end-to-end path to becoming a node provider on the Internet Computer, organized as six milestones from education through ongoing node management.

·May 4, 2026·4 min read

This entry lays out the full lifecycle of becoming a node provider on the Internet Computer. It is a roadmap rather than a deep technical guide: each milestone points at the focused entry that covers it.

For the role itself and current onboarding status, start with Node Provider Documentation.

Milestone one: education

Two preparatory steps before anything operational:

  1. Learn about the Internet Computer. Read the introductory material on this site and at internetcomputer.org to understand subnets, the Network Nervous System (NNS), "useful work", and ICP tokens.
  2. Learn what the role involves. Node providers run node machines on the network and earn rewards in return. Concretely they:
    • meet the published skill, hardware, and networking requirements,
    • onboard themselves as a provider through the NNS,
    • onboard each node machine,
    • perform their own maintenance when issues arise.

Acceptance is decided by the NNS — the Internet Computer's on-chain governance system. ICP token-holders vote on whether to admit a new provider.

Milestone two: requirements

The role expects practical infrastructure skills:

  • purchasing and racking server hardware,
  • preparing USB-based OS installers,
  • comfortable command-line operation,
  • diagnosing network connectivity issues,
  • understanding the operational differences between IPv6 and IPv4,
  • following standard security best practices.

A Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) certification or equivalent experience is strongly recommended.

Background reading before applying:

Milestone three: provider onboarding

Four steps to take before acquiring any hardware:

  1. Join the Node Provider Matrix channel to ask requirement questions and meet existing providers.
  2. Complete a self-declaration of identity and good intent — see Node Provider Self-declaration.
  3. Order and set up a hardware wallet (Ledger Nano) for managing ICP tokens and NNS neurons.
  4. Submit the onboarding proposal. Create a node provider ID and submit it to the NNS for community vote — see Node Provider Onboarding.

Milestone four: node onboarding preparation

Once accepted as a provider, prepare the infrastructure:

  1. Obtain hardware matching the published specification.
  2. Sign data-center contracts in suitable jurisdictions.
  3. Configure networking and rack the nodes per the networking guide.
  4. Reset the BMC password on each machine — a critical security step before the node ever sees the public network.

Milestone five: node machine onboarding

With NNS approval and hardware in place, install IC-OS on each node and have the candidate machines validated against the network's decentralization targets — see Validation of Candidate Node Machines.

[!NOTE] Every provider is asked to deploy at least two nodes with IPv4 reachability and a registered domain name in every data center they operate in. Additional nodes beyond that pair can run on IPv6 only.

Two installation paths exist depending on hardware generation:

[!WARNING] DFINITY does not offer live support for node providers attempting to onboard nodes. The community Matrix channel and the developer forum are the support channels.

After all nodes are running, submit a reward configuration proposal. Without it, rewards are not paid even if the nodes are healthy.

Milestone six: node management

Operating the fleet day to day:

Unanswered questions should be raised in the Node Provider Matrix channel.

Related