What is stopping people from running their own full node?

[shield132]

Recently setup a full node and it wasn't as challenging as I expected. I am wondering what is stopping more people from spinning up their own full nodes?

For me it seems not as many people care about the network, as they do about the price. I am wondering what you guys think, is this due to people not being aware of how important nodes are? Or due to the "technical" challenges they may face?

There is both factor. In overall you see articles around bitcoin and media makes it to look like bitcoin is just currency that has very unstable price and is used for illegal activities and etc. So when people watch to TV or read news online, they see that attention is maximized on bitcoin's possibilities (that it's anonymous cryptocurrency and etc). Also modern exchanges don't give any informatin about nodes. When user is under those impression from media and exchanges or other service providers, they don't even know what is node. Only those people who are seeking more information about bitcoin, understand what's nodes and what role it has in bitcoin. So number of such people is minimal and what makes it even less is that only some part of people really share this information and run node to support bitcoin.

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[kezinaur14]

Recently setup a full node and it wasn't as challenging as I expected. I am wondering what is stopping more people from spinning up their own full nodes?

For me it seems not as many people care about the network, as they do about the price. I am wondering what you guys think, is this due to people not being aware of how important nodes are? Or due to the "technical" challenges they may face?

Zero rewards stops most of us.

I have run them on and off.
They drain resources and eventually I grow tired of running them.
I should do one again as I am flush on pc's and have the resources in place.

Not exactly this, I feel like I do my part with BTC by recommending it to friends and helping them set up their own wallets and stuff, I might not be contributing with negligible hash power but I'm doing what I can to help the network.

But yeah your point is still strong in that, I would probably run a full node if I was incentivized in a meaningful way to do so, but I also don't have the resources to just dump to become a miner.

[Room101]

There are projects like abcore https://github.com/greenaddress/abcore, which can run a full un-pruned node on a mobile, I ran a full node on a Galaxy S7 with 512GB sd card for a while. Eventually phones will get to the point where every retailer could run a full node on a phone with a lightening node running, and use NFC / QR-codes to conduct all payments, without needing VISA or super expensive terminals.

[Debonaire217]

IMO op, it isn't a necessity for every one of us to have our own full running node in order to contribute to the bitcoin network. I think there is enough miners competing and they already have enough hashing power to verify each block and there's no need for us to have one. Though, it is still a great help to the bitcoin network if we will build one as one node is enough to restore the bitcoin network when the massive downfall of the network happens. In addition, it consumes huge power and I don't think every bitcoin user could afford that.

[Room101]

IMO op, it isn't a necessity for every one of us to have our own full running node in order to contribute to the bitcoin network. I think there is enough miners competing and they already have enough hashing power to verify each block and there's no need for us to have one. Though, it is still a great help to the bitcoin network if we will build one as one node is enough to restore the bitcoin network when the massive downfall of the network happens. In addition, it consumes huge power and I don't think every bitcoin user could afford that.

It consumes almost no power once it's synced, it would cost next to nothing to run a Pi all year long. The bigger cost is in network charges, they can consume 100's GB month, both up and down, so you really need an unlimited, reasonably fast connection to do it. Anything over 10Mbit is OK, over 50Mbit is ideal though.

Honestly, the more people run nodes, the more protection the network has from miners hijacking things, the less incentivized they are to try and strong arm us. If you have fast internet, and can afford a Pi and 1TB disk to plug into it, do it! A 1TB SSD is like $100 bucks now, if you have more than 4 figures invested in bitcoin, you should run one as a simple way to protect your investment. Individually you running one makes little difference, but collectively it makes all the difference in the world. And if you don't run one, and Bitcoin goes to zero because of some shitty hard fork initiated by miners or something, you will have no one to blame but yourself.

[TheBeardedBaby]

Not many people are voluntarily wasting time,hardware,bandwidth and electricity without gaining anything.
People those days associate bitcoin with becoming quickly rich and don't really care about the technology or the future that this technology may provide.
To run a node you should be one step ahead of the greed. I'm talking about ordinary users not miners.

[Wind_FURY]

Today's total of full nodes is very low compared with total of full nodes in past (when SPV/light wallet isn't popular and you can run full node at lower cost).

Historically,   until approximately beginning 2018 the number of full nodes was steadily increasing  reflecting a gradual expansion of  network  volumetric. It  has since stayed practically unchangeable -    in  the plot  below one can see the plateau (though with some fluctuations) which is remaining  to this day.

I meant total Bitcoin full nodes somewhere between 2010 - 2013, IIRC the number was greater than 10K, but unfortunately i can't find article about it.

I believe LukeDashJr's has a site that monitors the network more accurately. I forgot the URL though, but you can search for it.

As people have complained in the topic, COSTS stop them from running their nodes regularly, yet there are people in the forum who propose to increase the block size. It WILL set the costs higher, faster. BUT, you don't need to run a full node, right?

Then you hear the same trolls "complain" that mining is centralized.

[stompix]

IMO op, it isn't a necessity for every one of us to have our own full running node in order to contribute to the bitcoin network. I think there is enough miners competing and they already have enough hashing power to verify each block and there's no need for us to have one.
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In addition, it consumes huge power and I don't think every bitcoin user could afford that.

I think it's a necessity to learn the difference between mining and keeping a full node.
You don't mine with a node, you don't need an ASIC, you don't need more power than the average computer you don't need a dedicated GPU..
Just a bit of ram, a processor that was deemed decent a decade ago, a cheap ssd, ..that's all

But yeah your point is still strong in that, I would probably run a full node if I was incentivized in a meaningful way to do so, but I also don't have the resources to just dump to become a miner.

Same as the guy above you, running a full node is not mining.

Honestly, the more people run nodes, the more protection the network has from miners hijacking things, the less incentivized they are to try and strong arm us. If you have fast internet, and can afford a Pi and 1TB disk to plug into it, do it! A 1TB SSD is like $100 bucks now, if you have more than 4 figures invested in bitcoin, you should run one as a simple way to protect your investment yourself.

You don't even need a 1TB, you can deal with a 500GB one, it will last you for the next 3 years even with a W10 installed on it 
But as others have said, as it's not getting you any money in return, there is no incentive to run it, but I can understand it.
There are people who leave their coins on exchanges because they are not willing to deal with cold storage or buying a trezor, you can't expect them to run a node, let the miners and the exchanges do that...

Bandwidth. At the slightest hint of any upload my internet is paralysed. One photo takes several minutes and I can't do anything else in that time. I'm also constantly downloading so a node would grind me to a halt from every direction. If I had decent internet then I'd certainly look into it. I've never had it and may never have it so it's not a viable choice for me.

Oh god, I'm looking at BT's offers, 30£ for 50Mbits? 
At this pace, you're going to see Netflix and YT sponsoring the ISPs to get more fiber connections.

[coiningz]

For what ordinary people need to launch full node?

[Room101]

For what ordinary people need to launch full node?

Nobody needs to. You should anyway. It's a little bit like voting. Nobody needs to, but if nobody does, you probably won't like the results. It gives little ordinary people a tiny amount of power. And when thousands of them do it, they have more power than any other individual, no matter how powerful or rich or influential that individual is. See UASF.

[ChiBitCTy]

I'm not sure there's any reason that everyone should be running a full node anymore these days.  I'm no Mr Robot, but I believe there's a way of running a node and not having to download core.  When I first found out about bitcoin, I read Mastering Bitcoin.  I downloaded bitcoin core and that thing probably took two weeks to download. So just an fyi to anyone thinking of doing so.

[drmadison]

Running a full node is extremely easy as was mentioned. I started setting mine back up yesterday.
Took a fetch from a web server, an install, and launching bitcoind on my home server. Since yesterday it's up to block 413600... so it's taking quite a while to actually get caught up (as in, probably will take more than 24 hours) but hey, I have a ton of storage on that server, and it's already running 24/7.

CPU and RAM needs to seem to be more substantial than I remember, but I think that's just because it's in catch-up mode. If I recall correctly from when I used to run a full node, once it's settled it's pretty minimal.

[fiulpro]

The thing is one is most of the times using mobile apps and all people with technical background are very less , I do think that the limited space , the electricity bills plus possible extra payment for internet and other charges is actually problematic.. therefore I do think full node is not something everyone can run . If you have good internet connection and all you can easily do it , if you can afford to pay extra electricity bills and all .
Also many people do not know about the full node maybe everyone should help others with it.

[Ucy]

There is clearly something wrong (that needs fixing) if more people aren't running full nodes. As a community-driven thing, it should be made as easy as possible for almost everyone to run a full node without compromising on security.
The network would be much safer and robust if it's more participatory.
Size and syncing discourages me from running full nodes.  Imagine downloading and running multiple nodes from different cryptocurrencies on thesame device. Besides, I am usually not comfortable using valuable things that most people will find hard to use.

[thomasheller]

I just launched my first full node. Took 74 hours to sync, on a Digital Ocean droplet. Happy though 

[Wind_FURY]

For what ordinary people need to launch full node?

To verify/validate that you actually received the coins sent to you. You can trust someone else to do it for you for convenience, but what would be the point of Bitcoin if you CAN'T do it yourself? OR if your ability to run one is taken away from you?

Newbies, never fall in the big blockers' trap when they say, "Users don't need to run full nodes". "Maybe" you don't need to run one, but NO ONE should take away your ability to run one.

[imstillthebest]

yes its because people dont know if what nodes are  . they think that its too hard to set it up so they decide to not get involved on it . me either thats my reason too on why i dont involved on it but after seeing this thread , im convince about your statement that maybe setting up one isnt that really hard but i also remember that no things will be hard as long as you are willing to do it . you will learn it and there are now many reference online that we can use to make things more easier

[roman100]

While there are no monetary rewards, running a full bitcoin node comes with its own intangible benefits. For example, it increases the security of transactions conducted by a user. This is especially important if you plan to conduct multiple bitcoin transactions. Depending on your short, medium, and long-term goals, each option has different benefits for your preferred method of earning Bitcoin.