The Infrastructure Stack for 0-Slot Solana Execution

November 20, 2025•AllenHark Team

The Infrastructure Stack for 0-Slot Solana Execution

"What server do I need?" is the most common question we get from aspiring MEV searchers.

But achieving 0-Slot Execution—landing a transaction in the same 400ms window that you read the signal—isn't just about buying a fast server. It's about the entire pipeline.

Here is the battle-tested infrastructure stack required to consistently win on Solana.

1. The Hardware (Co-Location is Mandatory)

You cannot compete from AWS us-east-1 or your home fiber connection. Speed of light is your enemy.

  • Location: You must be in Frankfurt (FRA) or New York (NY), where the majority of Solana stake is hosted.
  • The Server:
    • CPU: High-frequency cores are king. AMD EPYC 9004 series (Genoa) or Ryzen 7950X. You need single-core performance for transaction signing and logic.
    • RAM: DDR5 ECC Memory. Fast memory access is crucial for processing Shred streams.
    • Network: 10Gbps or 25Gbps uplink.

Recommendation: AllenHark Co-Location offers bare metal Ryzen servers in the same datacenter racks as major validators, giving you <1ms internal latency.

2. The Read Layer (Signal Detection)

You can't act on what you can't see. Public RPCs are 500ms behind reality.

  • Requirement: You need to see the "future" before it's finalized.
  • Solution: Solana Shreds (Turbine).
    • Shreds are the raw UDP packets validators share to build blocks.
    • Listening to shreds allows you to see a transaction while the leader is still building the block.
    • AllenHark Shredstream provides a normalized feed of these packets with zero overhead.

3. The Write Layer (Propagation)

This is where most stacks fail. You have the signal, you built the tx, but you use a slow method to send it.

  • Requirement: Direct-to-Leader delivery.
  • Solution: AllenHark 0-Slot Relay.
    • Bypasses gossip.
    • Uses staked connections to penetrate validator QUIC rate limits.
    • Delivers payloads directly to the TPU port.

The Complete 0-Slot Architecture

Here is how the pieces fit together:

  1. Ingest: AllenHark Shreds stream raw block data to your Co-located Server (Latency: 0.02ms).
  2. Process: Your Rust/C++ bot decodes the shred, identifies an arb, and signs a tx (Latency: <0.5ms).
  3. Send: You push the tx to AllenHark Relay (Latency: 0.1ms).
  4. Land: The Relay pushes it to the Leader (Latency: <5ms).

Total Round Trip: <6ms. Slot Duration: 400ms.

Result: You land comfortably in the same slot, beating every competitor using standard RPCs.

Conclusion

Infrastructure isn't a commodity; it's your competitive advantage. You can write the smartest code in the world, but if your infrastructure adds 200ms of latency, you will lose to a simpler bot running on better metal.

Ready to build your stack?