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Epoch and Reward Schedule

How the Flow protocol manages the schedule of an epoch and rewards payments


This information covers the current state of how epoch phases are ran and how rewards are calculated and distributed to node operators and delegators. All of the information in the document is still being designed and is subject to change based on research and discussion by the Flow core team and community. If any changes are proposed, the Flow community will be notified in advance.

Schedule

Flow Epoch Schedule

An Epoch is a period of time when the node operators in the network are constant. At epoch boundaries, newly staked node operators are able to join the network and existing node operators which have unstaked may exit the network.

Each epoch lasts approximately a week, and the Epoch Switchover is defined as the point in time when one epoch ends and the next epoch begins, marking a possible change in the list of valid nodes.

The exact timing of the epoch end is influenced by the number of blocks proposed during the epoch. All quoted epoch end times are estimates and subject to some variance (up to a few hours). See Epoch Preparation Protocol for details.

Staking Operations will be disabled for the last day of an epoch, typically around 12:00pm (7:00pm UTC) on Tuesday every, until the next day around the same time.

Epoch Switchovers will happen around 12:00 pm PT on Wednesday (7:00 pm UTC) every week. Please note exact epoch ending time vary based on the performance of the network & all staking operations that interact with staked tokens will be processed by the protocol at the start of each epoch.

Rewards

Rewards are also paid at 12:00 pm PT on Wednesday (7:00 pm UTC), every week, to all users that have tokens staked. This is the same time as the Epoch Switchover. See the Rewards Distribution section below for more information about rewards calculation and schedule.

Staking Auction

The first, and longest phase of an epoch is the staking auction. This phase is when nodes and delegators can register to stake and perform other staking operations such as staking more tokens or unstaking their existing tokens. None of these operations are fully executed until the Epoch Switchover though.

The Staking Auction lasts for at least the first 90% of the length of an Epoch

Epoch Setup and Epoch Commit

The Epoch Setup and Epoch Commit phases are the final phases of the epoch, when node operators who have been included in the next epoch perform important setup functionailty to prepare for the next epoch.

The Epoch Setup and Epoch Committed phases usually last less than 10% of the time of an epoch.

Staking Operations will be rejected during the Epoch Setup and Epoch Commit phases. This is because the staking information has been finalized in preparation for the next epoch and cannot be changed because these final phases rely on the staking information being constant.

The Staking Auction Ends every Tuesday at 12:00pm PT (7:00 pm UTC). This means that staking operations will be disabled for ALL users in the period between the end of the staking auction and the beginning of the next epoch, currently 24hrs.

Rewards Distribution

The rewards distribution schedule has been designed to ensure there is enough liquid supply of FLOW available in the ecosystem to empower a wide variety of use cases and promote fair and diverse participation in the Flow ecosystem.

The numbers in this table represent the total amount of tokens that are paid as staking rewards at each epoch to the entire pool of participants in the Flow network as a whole. While total staking reward per epoch is known and fixed, individual rewards are variable depending on many factors.

The total rewards for each epoch are fixed for that epoch, but where those rewards come from can change. When the protocol pays rewards, it first pulls from the central pool of all the transaction fees that have been paid by every user in the network since the last rewards payment. Once that pool has been depleted, the protocol mints new tokens that are used as rewards.

Please see the next section on how to calculate an individual staking reward.

Dec 22Dec 29, Jan 5, 12, 19, 26Feb 2 weekly on Tuesdays until Dec 21, 2021Weeks 53+
Total Rewards % (Annual)5%20%5%TBD
Total Rewards Amount Per Week~1.2M FLOW~4.4M FLOW~1.2M FLOWTBD

Individual Calculation

Each user gets a percentage of the total rewards during each epoch that is proportional to their percentage of all the tokens that are staked by all participants.

The full reward calculation on a per-user basis is equal to:

New Reward(user) = Tr  * (Sn / St)  

where:

  • Tr = Total staking rewards to be paid out during the current epoch. (See table above)
  • Sn = Amount of FLOW Staked by the target user for the current Epoch. (Different for each staker)
  • St = Sum of all the FLOW staked by all the participants in the network. (Changes every epoch)

Rewards for delegators are also calculated in the exact same way that rewards for node operators are calculated, with one difference in that 8% of the staking reward amount is given to the node operator being delegated to (effected as a protocol layer fee, which is the same for all node operators). The remaining 92% is awarded to the delegator. Note: the 8% fee is only applied to the staking reward, not to the tokens delegated.

With this calculation, the node you choose to run or delegate to DOES NOT affect the amount of rewards you receive every week. The only variable that you can control is the number of tokens you have staked. The more tokens you stake, the more rewards you will receive.

Because of the variable nature of the rewards calculation, we cannot provide an expected weekly/yearly return for a single staker. You can plug your own numbers into the formula to see some sample calculations, but you won't be able to know exactly what you will earn until the beginning of the epoch in which you are participating in staking or delegation.

Rewards History

Epoch StartEpoch EndReward Payout Transaction ID
December 16, 2020December 22, 20201ab22491777fb3c75333135c82b90a9f56ede8e0d18d43ecf6c5589d06353f95
December 23, 2020December 29, 2020d7a8daca55dcadddd21dc9b63e71c515032584e9cf126b74744f676a1196e3c8
December 30, 2020January 5, 20219e377e6818d19b7a26d65b076120b2681d512111d397c617cac0843060437fc9
January 6, 2021January 12, 202129886f7cdbbb47b96dfa05ad277fcb3c8876c4ee32954269a926061aa4157af7
January 13, 2021January 19, 202183d585f3fa1368258cf317690e4bf82d4f841bfe2ccbc6c191838b73371b6e66
January 20, 2021January 26, 2021487759099a09fc088943aac45909cca37d6b5bed418feab502ff37bd1b93346f
January 27, 2021February 2, 2021c2f29629040ae6fca12e103f676bf112200f24f0fc8b4cb99c92f9287ce6195f
February 3, 2021February 9, 2021e29a22e29297fcd8f67a030ae641405e14a889167a639f54b05f48fe1142bd5b
February 10, 2021February 16, 2021d775735a1d9a8574faaa2b82b9dea0833d5bf48e43845c9c6bf5a42eb96414f2
February 17, 2021February 23, 2021eed4f38fe4fec2bf9b60eba7708ff7d41fa654942ccc20cb1fc86872813f5b93
February 24, 2021March 2, 20213650b50994719480b8358a507afa30d58c232a30a6cfd947a94b62a78d25c849
March 3, 2021March 9, 2021e4db187672cf545c865850840ff66d34c43cb298d8aae687c209c7f2fef44ea1
March 10, 2021March 16, 20212791557e2bdf4be66f69eeb919c5c3da94f2af4baf9c1e6953aedd887715bd7e
March 17, 2021March 23, 202115ac2d8ee73eae3483da10370dcc6f432d928d4631be22f8c7f0f85a8a62e1fd
March 24, 2021March 30, 2021a60e812b005100290a4657f7022f1e2d3dc4745e25a0373b82d807c77471e069
March 31, 2021April 6, 20217674a088faa2b30ace3c798c2273face4e2b41970ca1990ad9d96a1bb7e2c2b2
April 7, 2021April 13, 20214addbcc17f8a5e9ecf1eb0d78a5c59332cde9d11ce347da676009284247565dd
April 14, 2021April 20, 202186917dcf3055d1aa21d898ccd4b8d1f55fd0924c7f5b7ce708dd92e69094e83d
April 21, 2021April 27, 20215c46cc3ff35a522d9439f26023e11a0f8697bf04b418e9e019a95ab3f49231ce
April 28, 2021May 4, 20217c79febe209178851e4c6b0c1d9bf89955f89783ea8f9ace65e4c442ddd16e7d
May 4, 2021May 11, 2021df60fda0991410b871b80437840e461ecd5b35decc6da201a1e5d62ae23b0cec
May 11, 2021May 18, 2021a0ea12fe8166b3d3b10cb221cbc3dd236dba5990274e9a90c32e6a904f72d96f
May 18, 2021May 25, 20215a3093f7e577ba8e6dc3c6241c7b3a0c09d3068a91a684a477277d4f792e19da
May 25, 2021June 1, 20216e97bf58f0261bbf06733c7b225f56f32032dd974e73aa8c2c72e2fddd6ab4f9
June 1, 2021June 8, 20218d06b6d75fd315cdbe0caf035fb42b8503aef5f12b875fb18c38b9329cf10b83
June 8, 2021June 15, 20219b86013070876210c5ff04c5518d7698d21be2c3d4525cf985a82b311e7bb217
June 15, 2021June 22, 2021207f908a7e949c1094dee63f71bf9f8487e07d8a2d904265b358ee03dc59441a
June 22, 2021June 29, 2021f9cc19931aa131511951ff339dd3c454cdc7d956611cf0271e68c0ed50f6fca2
June 29, 2021July 6, 2021406c3fe36fb4eb05cb3ba830cb0a8b66b6fc6d6f3d56e237eef201fe3b7b9821
July 6, 2021July 13, 2021ade3ad62894c99798876b0c8fb9db84e978a14e23095944abcf76d614e5c018b
July 13, 2021July 20, 202151dab505c0bd843af3c3e43d5502cdc21c2f6dbb5765383b0a285f0578f859d4
July 20, 2021July 27, 20218730f4ff3552ca1e47777e51eda0169f49880bf49da19106839a8e20ae6bbec6
July 27, 2021August 3, 2021d8a85bdd767f56a63bcb627bd74b1fe47f6e0d50b9c19b32c47895ca8373d208
August 3, 2021August 10, 202180366137eb2665d52480b6d9592decb11c98dcb38657633673173503d94db711
August 10, 2021August 17, 202138364caf7310ebac175d40fe99b9e3ac636eb0d370e9f647f92bb3fe938915ff
August 17, 2021August 24, 20214a6a3c043f22661d32a1b894e89744d2427f35dfe590d7f563665502afd03075
August 24, 2021August 31, 2021109838b1910c72484e2789b5e60cfbab2e2a75da354b5e378397dae72f97e73e
August 31, 2021September 7, 20214bd3dc0284bfd077eb5eac7d39afd01df3e8125c45b07e2d3ea7e7e8512e09ef
September 7, 2021September 14, 20211746c7cf8e39e292c779a7891d788b4b8848b8ce5c8432007b7787fa262e286d
September 14, 2021September 21, 2021b5f214c3284e15b8e13f178582db069350ace98a81e086461da5977050a70962
September 21, 2021September 28, 2021a819c6ebd9bf8c969be0d43ce1f57a803c4fb4cba1e92ebd1de6403da73d426e
September 28, 2021October 5, 202110fd2d7642ec87e61a8222491297c9462c6fdc3d331662ff7115a0e1becb3e21
October 5, 2021October 12, 20218f2d439ba31c7824989977b4883a1f5bd59adc347ab9d2f62d07a6639f59bd67
October 12, 2021October 19, 2021ab8380881604ceae332783fa283b925b49f1c071e3e0eab7da1298570ed44c90
October 19, 2021October 26, 2021f6fafde942e8b9538f1b92163e31f9752655fad6e69673cc1232829df81d5256
October 26, 2021November 2, 2021cd9ad3758e9a08a1e9eb7dc0e7028de96ead624419403a30464c481476165d2a
November 2, 2021November 9, 20211cb1cf82f850d8f35d3e0114d9c5729dcfd7e9555e037ba4327bf7613263cf62
November 9, 2021November 16, 2021993e78c383dc071d7d1bc10f4b387aed83a243115a77c3e1ff7f69cf0503cefe
November 16, 2021November 23, 2021be839d4aab6a6443e1c6f16c77f7ee9134b3d923893c6ba8aa90b08647762bfe
November 23, 2021November 30, 20218bf3cb26e1d0996811c5855f4b99e1cea0c5244400f4d4e69fcfea2ec6f847ae
November 30, 2021December 7, 2021044f8191fad43dd8b40554ed65781a0862e420d9c2c5640aa3166f8be791c84d
December 7, 2021December 14, 2021df669cd5b615708e54d5589761906ca5137d4860f1f78a11ea3bed48ff458e82
December 14, 2021December 22, 202113ca79fc2fcb8adfb79cb7576bba5e7475e108f5c924083380b6958f5f56f58f
December 22, 2021December 29, 20219dcc4fff71e99b94a3dd90a953ef024d0cd9928e76fff69394134b6ef841ae21
December 29, 2021January 5, 2022ae25c41e18a798e565c9cc1d0ed4afe46bd75cad5b7ce04d92ec8515314d85b3
January 5, 2022January 12, 2022c1541b18ddd377983be4eda812100fb4b4baf5face603e6616e0f7d0391f8ddb
January 12, 2022January 19, 202296e5ecf9943aecdacc40c5b99fd0163bc917997d9da341d62364593c0ea729b3
January 19, 2022January 27, 202227c4302f4ff4ea9d50ec8f368705f77e897d20f83212ce5e6e1c58ecb784e853
January 27, 2022February 2, 2022e8d6f108901dfe67f89ea43e588e77e379bc465925dfb725bc07db5e665b0ab2
February 2, 2022February 9, 2022ba593876491dc3a53a8a33dd2709c25ce474e84a9d4d228d4309e1a7945a2e71
February 9, 2022February 16, 2022adc2c23f4a6e3c1bf2ba93d92adfc3dbbc7f9821226abb8576abf8f195d5a64e
February 16, 2022February 23, 2022b8329b2c39141ec9ee2a0fc3ba1ab8372fabcac8864ba54bd39355df8df0c3ef
February 23, 2022March 2, 2022ce5c402de62dbd6ccbe764739a6dae1187e751faf9a9179854eae31e9c9e4d26
March 2, 2022March 9, 202264a8781b0c6873d98ec30d5ef6ee296dcdddf93a8c2ec2e4378a6cfaea6b2631
March 9, 2022March 16, 20221f82f2b99296348450c9c7bd5da0a28b7d9b4d9b382c317aef1b782e22b324ca
March 16, 2022March 23, 20227b341be43ba69889f2ef37477c52b15c1ce18350815208a21f17728631dda1e0
March 23, 2022March 30, 20229941aac5fd7d280901fdda258388f455a9ec3d75bf910d1e161a7657f73e1c01