Why 'Just Use a Private RPC' Fails the Decentralization Test

Private RPCs are centralized gatekeepers. They reintroduce the single point of failure and censorship that decentralized networks like Ethereum were built to eliminate.

The performance trade-off is a false choice. Services like Alchemy and Infura optimize for speed by centralizing data, but this creates systemic risk for the applications that depend on them.

Decentralization is a binary state. A network is not 'decentralized enough'; a single trusted operator for core infrastructure, like an RPC endpoint, invalidates the security model.

Evidence: The 2022 Infura outage took down MetaMask, Uniswap, and other major dApps, proving that private RPC reliance creates correlated failure across the ecosystem.

Private RPCs are centralized chokepoints. A protocol using Alchemy or Infura delegates all data queries to a single corporate entity, which can censor, front-run, or serve stale data without detection.

Decentralization is a full-stack property. A decentralized application (dApp) with a centralized data layer is a contradiction; the security guarantees of the underlying chain (Ethereum, Solana) terminate at the RPC boundary.

The trust is merely shifted, not removed. Developers trade the trust minimization of cryptographic verification for the operational convenience of an API key, reintroducing a single point of failure.

Evidence: The 2022 Infura outage crippled MetaMask and major exchanges, proving that RPC reliance creates systemic risk. A truly resilient dApp architecture requires verifiable data access.

Private RPC endpoints centralize failure. They are a single point of control and censorship, contradicting the decentralized consensus they query. A developer's application inherits the uptime, latency, and governance of their chosen provider like Alchemy or Infura.

Decentralization is a chain's weakest link. A protocol's consensus is irrelevant if user access relies on a centralized gateway. This creates a trusted third-party for data availability, reintroducing the exact problem blockchains solve.

Provider risk is systemic. The Infura Ethereum outage of 2022 froze major dApps and wallets, proving reliance on centralized infrastructure creates network-wide fragility. This is not an edge case; it is the dominant architecture.

The economic model is misaligned. Providers optimize for enterprise SLAs and usage tiers, not censorship resistance or permissionless access. This creates a performance-for-decentralization tradeoff that most teams accept by default.

Private RPCs centralize flow. Services like Alchemy and Infura route transactions through proprietary mempools, bypassing public peer-to-peer networks. This creates a single chokepoint where a provider or regulator can filter transactions.

MEV protection enables censorship. Tools like Flashbots Protect and BloxRoute's private channels, designed to shield users from frontrunning, also give operators the power to silently drop transactions. The infrastructure for privacy is identical to the infrastructure for control.

Decentralization is a property of the network, not the endpoint. A user's choice of a private RPC does not preserve the system's censorship-resistant properties. The network's health depends on a robust, permissionless public mempool, which these services intentionally circumvent.

Evidence: During the OFAC sanctions on Tornado Cash, Infura and Alchemy complied with filtering requests, demonstrating that private RPCs are compliance tools. This proves the endpoint is the attack vector, not the solution.

Private RPCs centralize infrastructure. A single provider like Alchemy or Infura becomes a critical dependency, reintroducing the trusted third-party problem that blockchains were built to eliminate.

This creates systemic censorship risk. A centralized endpoint can filter, reorder, or censor transactions, undermining the permissionless access that defines networks like Ethereum and Solana.

The failure mode is catastrophic. If your private RPC fails, your entire application fails. This is not a hypothetical; it happened during Infura's 2020 outage, which bricked major wallets and dApps.

Evidence: The Ethereum community's push for distributed validator clients (Prysm, Lighthouse, Teku) and services like POKT Network exists precisely to mitigate this exact centralization vector.

Private RPCs centralize failure. A dApp using a single provider like Alchemy or Infura delegates all user access to that provider's infrastructure. This reintroduces the exact single point of failure that decentralized networks were built to eliminate.

Decentralization is a systems property. A network's decentralization is defined by its weakest link. If the primary user-facing gateway is centralized, the network's censorship resistance is theoretical. An attacker or regulator only needs to target the RPC endpoint.

The data proves the risk. During Infura's 2022 Ethereum outage, major wallets like MetaMask and entire Layer 2 networks like Polygon became unusable. This demonstrated that RPC dependence is systemic risk, not a convenience.

The solution is architectural. Protocols must integrate decentralized RPC networks like Pocket Network or build with lightweight clients. The goal is end-to-end decentralization, where no single entity controls data flow from the user to the chain.