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Kusama Parameters

Many of these parameter values can be updated via on-chain governance. If you require absolute certainty of these parameter values, it is recommended you directly check the constants by looking at the chain state and/or storage.

Periods of common actions and attributesโ€‹

NOTE: Kusama generally runs 4x as fast as Polkadot, except in the time slot duration itself. See Polkadot Parameters for more details on how Kusama's parameters differ from Polkadot's.

  • Slot: 6 seconds *(generally one block per slot, although see note below)
  • Epoch: 1 hour (600 slots x 6 seconds)
  • Session: 1 hour (6 sessions per Era)
  • Era: 6 hours (3600 slots x 6 seconds)
KusamaTimeSlots*
Slot6 seconds1
Epoch1 hour600
Session1 hour600
Era6 hours3_600

*A maximum of one block per slot can be in a canonical chain. Occasionally, a slot will be without a block in the chain. Thus, the times given are estimates. See Consensus for more details.

Accounts, Identity and Crowdloansโ€‹

  • The Existential Deposit is
  • The deposit required to set an Identity is
  • The minimum contribution required to participate in a crowdloan is

Governanceโ€‹

DemocracyTimeSlotsDescription
Voting period7 days100_800How long the public can vote on a referendum.
Launch period7 days100_800How long the public can select which proposal to hold a referendum on, i.e., every week, the highest-weighted proposal will be selected to have a referendum.
Enactment period8 days115_200Time it takes for a successful referendum to be implemented on the network.
CouncilTimeSlotsDescription
Term duration1 day14_400The length of a council member's term until the next election round.
Voting period1 day14_400The council's voting period for motions.

The Kusama Council consists of up to 19 members and up to 19 runners up.

Technical committeeTimeSlotsDescription
Cool-off period7 days604_800The time a veto from the technical committee lasts before the proposal can be submitted again.
Emergency voting period3 hours1_800The voting period after the technical committee expedites voting.

Staking, Validating, and Nominatingโ€‹

A maximum of 24 validators can be nominated by a nominator on Kusama.

KusamaTimeSlotsDescription
Term duration6 hours3_600The time for which a validator is in the set after being elected. Note, this duration can be shortened in the case the a validator misbehaves.
Nomination period6 hours3_600How often a new validator set is elected.
Bonding duration7 days604_800How long until your funds will be transferrable after unbonding. Note that the bonding duration is defined in eras, not directly by slots.
Slash defer duration7 days604_800Prevents overslashing and validators "escaping" and getting their nominators slashed with no repercussions to themselves. Note that the bonding duration is defined in eras, not directly by slots.

Treasuryโ€‹

TreasuryTimeSlotsDescription
Periods between spends6 days86_400When the treasury can spend again after spending previously.

Burn percentage is currently 0.20%, though instead of being burned this amount is temporarily redirected into the Society's treasury to fund growth.

Precisionโ€‹

KSM have 12 decimals of precision. In other words, 1e12 (1_000_000_000_000, or one trillion) Plancks make up a single KSM.