Staking Protocol

There are three levels of participation with increasing responsibility and reward profiles. See the table below for a high-level explanation of the different levels, rewards and risks. For early backers, as outlined in Tokenomics, we are rewarding up to 10% of the total supply of ROOT tokens over 260 weeks as part of our Bootstrap Rewards.

Please note tokenomics for The Root Network are subject to change in future.

Participation Level	Rewards	Risks
Staker	Earn rewards based on ROOT staked by the duration of the reward cycle. Earn 0.024640657 ROOT per ROOT staked for the reward cycle. This is rewarded in Vortex tokens at the end of the 90-day cycle.	Staked ROOT is locked. You can unstake at any time with a 28-day cool-down period. Note: Withdrawing before the end of the reward cycle will result in the forfeiture of rewards from that cycle.
Nominator	Earn based on ROOT staked by the duration of the reward cycle. Earn 0.049281314 ROOT per ROOT staked for the reward cycle. This is rewarded in Vortex tokens at the end of the 90-day cycle. Also, earn based on work done by validators you nominated, based on commission percentage and amount of Work points accumulated during the reward cycle.	In addition to the notes from above, staked ROOT is exposed to slashing risk from the validators you nominate. Being a nominator is not set and forget. Nominations should be periodically monitored.
Validator	Earn based on ROOT staked by the duration of the reward cycle. Earn 0.073921971 ROOT per ROOT staked for the reward cycle. This is rewarded in Vortex tokens at the end of the 90-day cycle. Earn based on work done as a validator, less commission you pay to nominators for selecting you.	Your staked ROOT is exposed to slashing risks. Investment and skills required to set up, run and maintain a validator node.

• All participants are rewarded at the end of the 90-day reward cycle, and you must still be staking in at the end of the 90-day reward cycle to receive your rewards.

• Note that you can either stake or nominate from the same wallet.

Staking

• Stake your ROOT tokens for a reward cycle and choose not to nominate any validators. This is a low-risk method of participating.

• By not taking on slashing risks for a nominator, your reduced risk is paired with a reward proportional to your risk.

• You can stake at any point of the reward cycle. Your rewards are prorated by the duration you staked.

• How to stake? Refer to this section.

Unstaking

Withdrawing your funds from staking involves two steps in canceling a stake:

• Unstake: This step schedules the unlocking and removal of some of the bond from the staking system. It's important to note that when you begin the unbonding process, you are still staked until you withdraw.

• Withdraw: After the unstake process is complete, it returns the unstaked funds to your stash account. Withdrawal can only be performed once the unstake process has finished.

Note that there is a time delay of 28 days for unstaking. You will not receive any rewards during the 28 day period, because the stake is in transit and cannot be used for any purposes. This 28-day waiting period is an industry-wide practice designed to prevent malicious actors from immediately exiting the system with their stake.

Nominating

This is the next level of participation. To become a nominator, you need to stake at least 25 ROOT.

During the staking flow, you choose to nominate one or more validators. You can nominate at any point in the reward cycle. Your rewards are prorated by the duration you staked.

In each Era (24 hours), the protocol elects validators to complete blocks and transactions, earning them Work points. When you nominate multiple validators, you increase your chances of earning rewards from elected validators. The nomination algorithm automagically determines how best to allocate your nominated ROOT equally across active and earning validators for each Era. It's worth noting that most nominators will likely see only one active and earning validator during an Era. That means all your staked ROOT will be nominated to the one active validator.

Note: Some validators may become oversubscribed. If this happens, only the top 256 nominators (sorted by the amount of ROOT nominated) will earn rewards. Oversubscribed validators will have badges clearly indicating their status. You can also exclude them by clicking filter and selecting exclude oversubscribed validators.

Validating

Validating is tailored for more technically-minded participants. Validators play a critical role in forging blocks and completing transactions on the network. This role demands technical knowledge, infrastructure cost, and entails higher rewards, albeit with additional risks.

For a comprehensive guide on how to become a validator, see Become a Validator.

Slashing

In The Root Network, slashing is a pivotal tool to counteract harmful actions by imposing penalties on validators acting counter to the network's welfare and that of their backers (nominators). Such deterrents ensure that validators, driven by the potential loss of their staked tokens, are incentivized to act favorably for the network.

A validator's misstep or adversarial conduct triggers the slashing mechanism. Such behaviors could range from prolonged unavailability, like being offline with numerous others, launching attacks on the network, or employing altered software. The magnitude of the slashed amount is directly proportional to the gravity of the misdeed. Slashed ROOT will go to The Root Network Treasury.

Minor offenses (like a validator being offline for a prolonged period) will not incur slashing. They will stop validating until the issue is fixed, and they re-declare their intention to validate. The slashing mechanism is triggered only if 10% or more active validators simultaneously go offline (which could mean there’s an attack on the network).

Staking Dashboard

Staking Dashboard

Nominator Status

On the staking dashboard, when you nominate a validator (or multiple validators), you will see one of three statuses:

• Inactive: This means that the validator you nominated is not nominating in this current Era (if you’ve nominated several validators, all but one will display as inactive).

• Waiting: You will see this status when you first nominate a validator or change nominations. This means the nomination will not be confirmed until the next Era.

• Active and earning: This means the validator was chosen, and your nomination actively supports it in this Era.

Share of Staking Rewards

Your share of staking rewards is based on your staked ROOT relative to the total staked by all participants. This value updates at the end of each Era. This metric is a key input used at the end of the reward cycle to distribute VORTEX rewards.

Share of Work Points Rewards

Your share of Work point rewards compared to total Work points by all participants. This value updates at the end of each Era. This metric is a key input used at the end of the reward cycle to distribute VORTEX rewards. You will only see values here if you are nominating a validator.

Bootstrap Rewards

Your share of Bootstrap rewards is based on your participation level and staked ROOT. This value updates at the end of each Era.