Arbitrum is an EVM Layer 2 that settles to Ethereum as a Stage 1 optimistic rollup on the Nitro stack. Blocks arrive about every 250 ms, and the BoLD protocol lets anyone with the required stake propose or challenge state. Since September 2026, Priority Gas Auctions order transactions by priority fee in short rounds, replacing Timeboost. Stylus runs Rust, C and C++ contracts alongside Solidity, though new Stylus activations have been paused since October 2. Orbit lets teams launch their own chains on the same stack.
GetBlock runs Arbitrum Nitro full and archive nodes on mainnet and Sepolia in Frankfurt, New York and Singapore, over JSON-RPC and WebSocket. Limitless Nodes give flat-rate throughput from 25 RPS, and Dedicated Nodes for exchanges and bridges add RPC failover and IP allowlists. In October 2026, OpenChainBench ranked GetBlock first among paid Arbitrum providers on cold-start latency, at 27 ms.