Aztec-Network Prover Node Guide

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✨ Overview

This repository contains a step-by-step guide to deploy and operate an Aztec Prover Node on the public alpha-testnet.
A Prover continuously generates ZK proofs that attest to roll-up integrity — a core security pillar of the Aztec protocol.

Heads-up 💡
• This guide is intended for hobbyists and testnet enthusiasts. It is not an airdrop or rewards tutorial.
• Run the Prover and Sequencer with separate wallets and servers to avoid nonce issues and port conflicts.

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🖥 Minimum Hardware

Resource	Recommended	Notes
RAM	128 GB +	Proof generation is memory intensive
CPU	32 cores +	More cores → faster proving
Disk	1 TB NVMe SSD +	High I/O throughput is essential

Running below these specs will likely trigger Error: Epoch proving failed: Proving cancelled because the machine cannot finish proofs before the epoch deadline.

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💸 Helpful Services

Purpose	Provider	Plan	Indicative Cost*
Bare-metal server	Hetzner	AX102	€116/mo (+€44 setup)
Ethereum RPC	Chainstack	Growth	$49/mo

* Costs are approximate and subject to change.

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🚀 Quick Start

1 System packages

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y

# Essentials
sudo apt install -y curl build-essential wget lz4 automake autoconf \
  tmux htop pkg-config libssl-dev tar unzip

2 Docker CE

Remove any old Docker versions and install the official repository:

for pkg in docker.io docker-doc docker-compose podman-docker containerd runc; do 
  sudo apt-get remove -y "$pkg" || true
done

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y ca-certificates curl gnupg
sudo install -m 0755 -d /etc/apt/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg
sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg

echo "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg] \
  https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu $(. /etc/os-release && echo "$VERSION_CODENAME") stable" | \
  sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-buildx-plugin docker-compose-plugin

sudo systemctl enable docker --now

3 Aztec CLI

bash -i <(curl -s https://install.aztec.network)

echo 'export PATH="$HOME/.aztec/bin:$PATH"' >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

aztec -V   # should print version

4 Firewall (UFW)

sudo ufw allow ssh
sudo ufw allow 8080
sudo ufw allow 40400
sudo ufw allow 40400/udp
sudo ufw --force enable

5 Directory layout

mkdir ~/prover && cd ~/prover

Create .env:

P2P_IP=<YOUR_PUBLIC_SERVER_IP>
ETHEREUM_HOSTS=<EXECUTION_RPC_ENDPOINT>
L1_CONSENSUS_HOST_URLS=<CONSENSUS_RPC_ENDPOINT>
PROVER_PUBLISHER_PRIVATE_KEY=0x<PRIVATE_KEY>
PROVER_ID=0x<YOUR_WALLET_ADDRESS>

6 docker-compose.yml

name: aztec-prover
services:
  prover-node:
    image: aztecprotocol/aztec:latest
    command:
      - node
      - --no-warnings
      - /usr/src/yarn-project/aztec/dest/bin/index.js
      - start
      - --prover-node
      - --archiver
      - --network
      - alpha-testnet
    depends_on:
      broker:
        condition: service_started
    environment:
      P2P_ENABLED: "true"
      DATA_DIRECTORY: /data-prover
      P2P_IP: ${P2P_IP}
      DATA_STORE_MAP_SIZE_KB: "134217728"
      ETHEREUM_HOSTS: ${ETHEREUM_HOSTS}
      L1_CONSENSUS_HOST_URLS: ${L1_CONSENSUS_HOST_URLS}
      LOG_LEVEL: info
      PROVER_BROKER_HOST: http://broker:8080
      PROVER_PUBLISHER_PRIVATE_KEY: ${PROVER_PUBLISHER_PRIVATE_KEY}
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
      - "40400:40400"
      - "40400:40400/udp"
    volumes:
      - ./data-prover:/data-prover
    entrypoint: >
      sh -c 'node --no-warnings /usr/src/yarn-project/aztec/dest/bin/index.js \
        start --network alpha-testnet --archiver --prover-node'

  agent:
    image: aztecprotocol/aztec:latest
    command:
      - node
      - --no-warnings
      - /usr/src/yarn-project/aztec/dest/bin/index.js
      - start
      - --prover-agent
      - --network
      - alpha-testnet
    entrypoint: >
      sh -c 'node --no-warnings /usr/src/yarn-project/aztec/dest/bin/index.js \
        start --network alpha-testnet --prover-agent'
    environment:
      PROVER_AGENT_COUNT: "3"
      PROVER_AGENT_POLL_INTERVAL_MS: "10000"
      PROVER_BROKER_HOST: http://broker:8080
      PROVER_ID: ${PROVER_ID}
    restart: unless-stopped
    volumes:
      - ./data-prover:/data-prover

  broker:
    image: aztecprotocol/aztec:latest
    command:
      - node
      - --no-warnings
      - /usr/src/yarn-project/aztec/dest/bin/index.js
      - start
      - --prover-broker
      - --network
      - alpha-testnet
    environment:
      DATA_DIRECTORY: /data-broker
      LOG_LEVEL: info
      ETHEREUM_HOSTS: ${ETHEREUM_HOSTS}
      P2P_IP: ${P2P_IP}
    volumes:
      - ./data-broker:/data-broker
    entrypoint: >
      sh -c 'node --no-warnings /usr/src/yarn-project/aztec/dest/bin/index.js \
        start --network alpha-testnet --prover-broker'

7 Start the stack

docker compose up -d

Check containers:

docker ps

8 Logs & Monitoring

# Follow general prover logs
docker logs -f aztec-prover-prover-node-1

# Filter for proven epochs
docker logs -f aztec-prover-prover-node-1 2>&1 | grep --line-buffered -E 'epoch proved|epoch'

# Filter for submitted proofs
docker logs -f aztec-prover-prover-node-1 2>&1 | grep --line-buffered -E 'Submitted'

You can also verify activity by pasting your PROVER_ID on Sepolia Etherscan.

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🛠 Maintenance

Task	Command
Restart	docker compose restart
Tear down	docker compose down -v

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🤝 Contributing

Pull requests are welcome! Feel free to open an issue for suggestions, questions, or improvements.

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📜 License

This guide is released under the terms of the MIT License. See LICENSE for details.