Cardano Staking: Practical Information

We would like to put together a few useful and practical pieces of information related to Cardano staking. We plan to regularly update the article to keep the information precise and valid.

The document is split into more chapters. Every chapter is dedicated to one topic and you can skip between them.

Epochs and snapshots

Cardano network splits time into periods called epochs. One epoch lasts approximately 5 days. It means that if an epoch starts in the middle of Sunday then it ends approximately in the middle of Friday. The next epoch would start in the middle of Friday and ends in the middle of Wednesday.

At the beginning of each epoch, a snapshot is created. A snapshot is basically a record related to the distribution of ADA coins that have been used for staking in the previous epoch. It is the combination of pledges of pool operators and all delegated coins to their pools. Snapshots directly influence the total stakes of pools and their number of chances to become slot leaders and create blocks.

Let’s have a look at when you as a stakeholder can expect a reward.