Nearly a third of Ethereum node activity is hosted in the United States, with roughly 39% across the European Union excluding the UK, according to research published Friday by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. The distribution is Western-centric without being concentrated in any single country, Alexander Neumuller, research lead at the center, told The Block's daily show The Starting Block.
Concentration carries jurisdictional weight. In 2022, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission argued that it had jurisdiction over Ethereum because most nodes were hosted in the United States, meaning that transactions would fall under U.S. securities law.
Neumuller cautioned that the relationship between nodes and validators is not one-to-one, and that no one knows precisely how many validators run behind any given node. “Geographical distribution is something desirable for a network,” Neumuller said, adding that client software concentration presents a parallel risk, since a bug in a dominant client can propagate across the network.
The report notes that Ethereum does not require half of its validators to fail to disrupt the network; more than a third going dark at once can stop finalizing checkpoints, citing the research. The distribution is Western-centric without a single country dominating. Nodes cluster around three hosting providers: Hetzner, AWS, and OVH. Hetzner's terms of service at one point barred running blockchain nodes, though Neumuller said that may have since changed.
The report includes distribution data for both consensus and execution clients.
Network upgrades after the merge prompted the update to methodology, since software changes can alter how hardware draws power.
Concentration carries jurisdictional weight. In 2022, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission argued that it had jurisdiction over Ethereum because most nodes were hosted in the United States, meaning that transactions would fall under U.S. securities law. The report includes distribution data for both consensus and execution clients.
The report, titled "Ethereum After the Merge," reworks the methodology behind Cambridge's earlier estimates, incorporating empirical data on how nodes split between residential and commercial hosting rather than theoretical assumptions. Network upgrades after the merge prompted the update, Neumuller said, since software changes can alter how hardware draws power. The Ethereum Foundation supported the work, Neumuller said, thanking the organization for enabling the new estimate. He has not discussed the centralization findings with the foundation directly and characterized its emphasis on decentralization as his own reading of its public communications rather than anything conveyed to him.
“Geographical distribution is something desirable for a network,” Neumuller said. “Client software concentration presents a parallel risk, since a bug in a dominant client can propagate across the network.”
Neumuller described the current distribution as healthy, noting it as his personal opinion rather than a formal finding and encouraging ongoing monitoring by the community.
