Delegation Criteria

JitoSOL delegation criteria and methodology

Overview

The aim of Jito's Liquid Staking is to decentralize the network and improve the performance of the Solana blockchain. Validators that meet the minimum criteria may become eligible for a stake delegation. Stakenet automates this process using transparent scoring algorithms and safety mechanisms.

See current delegates at jito.network/stakepool.

Delegation requirements

Validators must meet all of the following binary criteria to be eligible for delegation (subject to change):

Run the Jito MEV-enabled client (have MEV commission in the last 30 epochs)
MEV commission ≤ 10% (evaluated over the last 30 epochs)
Validator commission ≤ 5% (evaluated over the last 30 epochs)
Historical commission ≤ 50% (across all validator history)
Not belong to the validator superminority (top 33.3% of total stake)
Not run unsafe consensus modifications
Using acceptable Tip Distribution merkle root upload authority (TipRouter or OldJito)
Not blacklisted by governance
Maintain ≥ 5 epochs of continuous voting with ≥ 5,000 SOL minimum stake
Vote on ≥ 97% of expected slots in each of the last 30 epochs

Failing any single criterion results in an overall score of zero, making the validator ineligible for delegation.

Scoring mechanism

Validators that pass all binary criteria are ranked using a 4-tier hierarchical scoring system. The score is encoded as a 64-bit value with the following priority order:

Inflation commission (highest priority): Lower commission validators are always preferred
MEV commission: Among validators with equal inflation commission, lower MEV commission is preferred
Validator age: Among validators equal on commissions, older validators (more epochs with vote credits) are preferred
Vote credits ratio: Among validators equal on all above, higher performance is preferred

The 4-tier score ensures that differences in higher-priority tiers (like inflation commission) always dominate lower-priority tiers. This raw score is then multiplied by all binary eligibility factors - if any factor is zero, the final score becomes zero.

The top 400 validators by overall score are selected for delegation in each 10-epoch cycle.

Delegation methodology

Each selected validator receives a target allocation of 1/400th of the total pool
Target allocations are percentage-based and scale automatically with pool growth
New deposits increase all validators' target stake proportionally

Rebalancing and safety caps

To protect JitoSOL yield, the system limits the amount of stake that can be moved per cycle:

Rebalancing type	Maximum unstake per cycle
Performance-based rebalancing	7.5% of total pool
Instant unstake triggers	10% of total pool
Stake deposit management	10% of total pool

Priority is given to removing stake from the lowest-performing validators first.

Instant unstaking criteria

The system evaluates validators each epoch for immediate removal based on:

Delinquency: Voting on less than 70% of expected slots (lower threshold than the 97% scoring requirement)
Commission manipulation: Increasing commission above 5% or MEV commission above 10%
Blacklist addition by governance
Using unacceptable Tip Distribution merkle root upload authority

Validators meeting any of these criteria are unstaked within the same epoch, subject to the 10% cap.

Parameters and transparency

All delegation parameters are stored on-chain and can be viewed at jito.network/stakenet/steward/config or queried using the steward CLI.

Changes to delegation requirements and parameters may occur based on Jito DAO governance decisions. The community will be notified in advance of any significant changes.