Kusama Validator Breakdown

Here are some analyses on Kusama Validators based on Self-Stake, Commission, Commission impact on return, Inclusion in the active set, and cost of running Validator on Kusama Network. As of writing this article (27 Aug 2021 — Era 2671), there are 900 active Validators and 868 Waiting Validators.
Out of all 1,768 Validators (Active + Waiting) only 1,256 have been in the Active set in the last 84 eras.

The current breakdown of all Validators based on commission:

What impact does the commission have on your Average return?

• Avg rewards earned per era 0.6 KSM or 2.4 KSM a day.

The current breakdown of Validators based on Self-Stake:

The current breakdown of Validators based on the number of Nominators:

• 124 Validator Nodes with 0 Nominators and 100% commission.
• 98 Validators Nodes with 0 Nominators, 100% commission, and less than 0.1 KSM Self Staked.

Current breakdown based on number of Validators run by single organization 8+ validators (12 Validator Operators run 323 Validator Nodes).

• Validator with the best return 18.84%
• Validator with worst return 2.67%
• Validator nodes with lower then AVG return 15.9% = 127 Validator nodes

Breakdown of all Validators and their inclusion in the Active Set is the last 84 Eras.

There are 512 Validators that have not been in the Active set in the last 84 Eras.

Running a Validator node doesn’t guarantee that it will be included in the Active Set.

To be included in the Active set Validator node has to have enough backing. At this time it is 3,810 KSM.

Cost of running Kusama Validator node

• 4 vCPU
• 8 GB of RAM
• 100 GB of NVMe SSD (Running in Pruned mode)
• 360 GB of NVMe SSD (Running in Archive mode)
• Do not use regular HDD (Spin Drives)!!

To make sure for smooth Validator upgrade it would be recommended to run a backup Validator Node on a separate server at Geographically Separated Location.

2 Servers at $48/Month = $96/Month = $3.2/Day

Time

• Setup Time + Sync~2 Hr per Validator Node
• On average 2 Hr per day to monitor the Validator Node (~60 Hr a Month)
• During Upgrade, add +10 Hr to Monitor/Troubleshoot the Validator Node.

Polkadot code Upgrades: Version (Priority)

• August: v0.9.9 (Low), v0.9.9–1 (High)
• July: v0.9.8 (High)
• June: v0.9.5 (High), v0.9.6 (High), v0.9.7 (Low)
• May: v0.9.0 (High), v0.9.1 (Low), v0.9.2 (High), v0.9.3 (High)
• April: v0.8.30 (Low)
• March: v0.8.29 (Low)
• February: v0.8.28 (Low), v0.8.28–1 (Medium)
• January: v0.8.27 (Low)

VPC

Digital Ocean —(Referral Link) https://m.do.co/c/21046a4e502d

OVH — https://www.ovh.com/

Vultr — (Referral Link) https://www.vultr.com/?ref=8877798

Support our Validators.

Polkadot — VEGAS LIFE/1 149riLdwAVzXg7Cm88RcXhbuFi3zUgwrGsJSSPjC47PRxHQW

Polkadot — VEGAS LIFE/2 1GqH2Y9UVqp6BNCbT7v5ucgksvFvDCPiBdFEa7vtAxVo1Pb

Kusama — VEGAS_LIFE_MAIN/1 Dq97kmsJXGTciU1eMXZMAp4D41Y9e7kQ4hmFBfZW7YD4CCf