Updating Consensus Client

Scenario: In discord, you see an alert that your consensus client just announced a new release. How best to update?

🚀 Automated Updates

💊Install EthPillar: a simple companion UI for node management!

Update your software with a keystroke.

To update, navigate to

EthPillar > Consensus Client > Update to latest release

EthPillar Update

⏩ Manual Updates

When a new release is cut, you will want to update to the latest stable release. The following shows you how to update your beacon chain and validator.

Always review the release notes before updating. There may be changes requiring your attention.

• Lighthouse

• Lodestar

• Teku

• Nimbus

• Prysm

🔥 Pro tip: Plan your update to overlap with the longest attestation gap. Learn how here.

Step 1: Select your consensus client.

Staking setups prior to July 2023:

Using beacon-chain as the consensus client service name? V1 update instructions available here.

Lighthouse

Option 1 - Download binaries

Run the following to automatically download the latest linux release, un-tar and cleanup.

RELEASE_URL="https://api.github.com/repos/sigp/lighthouse/releases/latest"
BINARIES_URL="$(curl -s $RELEASE_URL | jq -r ".assets[] | select(.name) | .browser_download_url" | grep x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz$)"

echo Downloading URL: $BINARIES_URL

cd $HOME
# Download
wget -O lighthouse.tar.gz $BINARIES_URL
# Untar
tar -xzvf lighthouse.tar.gz -C $HOME
# Cleanup
rm lighthouse.tar.gz

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/lighthouse
sudo mv $HOME/lighthouse /usr/local/bin/lighthouse
sudo systemctl start consensus validator

Option 2 - Build from source code

Build the binaries.

cd ~/git/lighthouse
git fetch --all && git checkout stable && git pull
make

💡Tip: Improve some Lighthouse benchmarks by around 20% at the expense of increased compile time? Use maxperf profile.

• To compile with maxperf, replace the above make command with

PROFILE=maxperf make

In case of compilation errors, run the following sequence.

rustup update
cargo clean
make

Verify lighthouse was built properly by checking the version number.

lighthouse --version

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/lighthouse
sudo cp $HOME/.cargo/bin/lighthouse /usr/local/bin/lighthouse
sudo systemctl start consensus validator

Lodestar

Option 1 - Build from source code

Pull the latest source and build Lodestar.

cd ~/git/lodestar
git checkout stable && git pull
yarn install
yarn run build

⚠️ In case of build errors or missing dependencies, run the following command.

yarn clean:nm && yarn install

Verify Lodestar was installed properly by displaying the version.

./lodestar --version

Sample output of a compatible version.

🌟 Lodestar: TypeScript Implementation of the Ethereum Consensus Beacon Chain.
  * Version: v1.8.0/stable/a4b29cf
  * by ChainSafe Systems, 2018-2022

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm -rf /usr/local/bin/lodestar
sudo cp -a $HOME/git/lodestar /usr/local/bin/lodestar
sudo systemctl start consensus validator

Teku

Option 1 - Download binaries

Run the following to automatically download the latest linux release, un-tar and cleanup.

RELEASE_URL="https://api.github.com/repos/ConsenSys/teku/releases/latest"
LATEST_TAG="$(curl -s $RELEASE_URL | jq -r ".tag_name")"
BINARIES_URL="https://artifacts.consensys.net/public/teku/raw/names/teku.tar.gz/versions/${LATEST_TAG}/teku-${LATEST_TAG}.tar.gz"
echo Downloading URL: $BINARIES_URL

cd $HOME
# Download
wget -O teku.tar.gz $BINARIES_URL
# Untar
tar -xzvf teku.tar.gz -C $HOME
# Rename folder
mv teku-* teku
# Cleanup
rm teku.tar.gz

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus

# If running Standalone Teku Validator
sudo systemctl stop validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm -rf /usr/local/bin/teku
sudo mv $HOME/teku /usr/local/bin/teku
sudo systemctl start consensus

# If running Standalone Teku Validator
sudo systemctl start validator

Option 2 - Build from source code

Fetch the latest tags and build the binaries.

cd ~/git/teku
# Get new tags
git fetch --tags
RELEASETAG=$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/ConsenSys/teku/releases/latest | jq -r .tag_name)
git checkout tags/$RELEASETAG
./gradlew distTar installDist

Verify Teku was built properly by displaying the version.

cd $HOME/git/teku/build/install/teku/bin
./teku --version

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus

# If running Standalone Teku Validator
sudo systemctl stop validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm -rf /usr/local/bin/teku
sudo cp -a $HOME/git/teku/build/install/teku /usr/local/bin/teku
sudo systemctl start consensus

# If running Standalone Teku Validator
sudo systemctl start validator

Nimbus

Option 1 - Download binaries

Run the following to automatically download the latest linux release, un-tar and cleanup.

RELEASE_URL="https://api.github.com/repos/status-im/nimbus-eth2/releases/latest"
BINARIES_URL="$(curl -s $RELEASE_URL | jq -r ".assets[] | select(.name) | .browser_download_url" | grep _Linux_amd64.*.tar.gz$)"

echo Downloading URL: $BINARIES_URL

cd $HOME
# Download
wget -O nimbus.tar.gz $BINARIES_URL
# Untar
tar -xzvf nimbus.tar.gz -C $HOME
# Rename folder
mv nimbus-eth2_Linux_amd64_* nimbus
# Cleanup
rm nimbus.tar.gz

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus
# If running standalone Nimbus Validator
sudo systemctl stop validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries, cleanup and restart the services.

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/nimbus_beacon_node
sudo rm /usr/local/bin/nimbus_validator_client
sudo mv nimbus/build/nimbus_beacon_node /usr/local/bin
sudo mv nimbus/build/nimbus_validator_client /usr/local/bin
rm -r nimbus
sudo systemctl start consensus
# If running standalone Nimbus Validator
sudo systemctl start validator

Reminder: In combined CL+VC Nimbus configuration, there will be no validator systemctl service.

Option 2 - Build from source code

Pull the latest source code and build the binary.

cd ~/git/nimbus-eth2
git checkout stable && git pull
make -j$(nproc) update
make -j$(nproc) nimbus_beacon_node
make -j$(nproc) nimbus_validator_client

Verify Nimbus was built properly by displaying the version.

cd $HOME/git/nimbus-eth2/build
./nimbus_beacon_node --version

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus
# If running standalone Nimbus Validator
sudo systemctl stop validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/nimbus_beacon_node
sudo rm /usr/local/bin/nimbus_validator_client
sudo cp $HOME/git/nimbus-eth2/build/nimbus_beacon_node /usr/local/bin
sudo cp $HOME/git/nimbus-eth2/build/nimbus_validator_client /usr/local/bin
sudo systemctl start consensus
# If running standalone Nimbus Validator
sudo systemctl start validator

Reminder: In combined CL+VC Nimbus configuration, there will be no validator systemctl service.

Prysm

Option 1 - Download binaries

Run the following to automatically download the latest binaries.

cd $HOME
prysm_version=$(curl -f -s https://prysmaticlabs.com/releases/latest)
file_beacon=beacon-chain-${prysm_version}-linux-amd64
file_validator=validator-${prysm_version}-linux-amd64
curl -f -L "https://prysmaticlabs.com/releases/${file_beacon}" -o beacon-chain
curl -f -L "https://prysmaticlabs.com/releases/${file_validator}" -o validator
chmod +x beacon-chain validator

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/beacon-chain
sudo rm /usr/local/bin/validator
sudo mv beacon-chain validator /usr/local/bin
sudo systemctl start consensus validator

Option 2 - Build from source code

Pull the latest source code and build the binaries.

cd $HOME/git/prysm
git fetch --tags
RELEASETAG=$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/prysmaticlabs/prysm/releases/latest | jq -r .tag_name)
git checkout tags/$RELEASETAG
go build -o=./build/beacon-chain ./cmd/beacon-chain
go build -o=./build/validator ./cmd/validator

Stop the services.

sudo systemctl stop consensus validator

Remove old binaries, install new binaries and restart the services.

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/beacon-chain
sudo rm /usr/local/bin/validator
sudo cp $HOME/git/prysm/build/beacon-chain /usr/local/bin
sudo cp $HOME/git/prysm/build/validator /usr/local/bin
sudo systemctl start consensus validator

Step 2: Verify services and logs are working properly

Lighthouse | Prysm | Lodestar | Nimbus | Teku

# Verify services status
sudo systemctl status consensus validator

# Check logs
sudo journalctl -fu consensus

sudo journalctl -fu validator

Combined BN+VC for Nimbus | Teku

Step 3: Optional - Verify your validator's attestations on public block explorer

1) Visit https://beaconcha.in/ or https://beaconscan.com/

2) Enter your validator's pubkey into the search bar and look for successful attestations.