MEV and Arbitrage Bot Infrastructure: The Complete 2026 Developer Guide

You have a profitable trading strategy on paper. Your backtests look promising. But when you deploy, your bot captures a fraction of the opportunities it should. The culprit is almost always infrastructure.

MEV opportunities exist for milliseconds. A 50ms delay can mean the difference between a profitable backrun and a missed opportunity. One quantitative trading operation discovered that 400ms of node latency was costing them 40% of potential arbitrage captures. After switching to faster infrastructure, their success rate jumped from 60 to 85 profitable trades per hundred attempts.

This guide covers everything you need to know about the infrastructure requirements for MEV extraction, from RPC endpoints to latency optimization to chain selection.

What Infrastructure Do MEV Bots Actually Need?

Before diving into specific components, here's the complete infrastructure stack for a production MEV bot:

• RPC endpoints with sub-100ms latency (dedicated nodes for serious operations)
• Mempool access via WebSocket subscriptions or private transaction relays
• Transaction simulation tools (Anvil, REVM, Tenderly) to verify profitability before submission
• Private relay access (Flashbots Protect, MEV Blocker) to prevent front-running of your own transactions
• Server infrastructure co-located near validators or block builders for minimal latency
• Monitoring and alerting for real-time performance tracking

The specific requirements vary by chain and strategy, but latency and reliability are non-negotiable for any MEV operation. To understand why, it helps to know what you are competing for.

Understanding MEV: The $7 Billion Opportunity

Maximal Extractable Value (MEV) refers to the profit that can be extracted by reordering, including, or excluding transactions within a block. Since 2020, over $7.2 billion in MEV has been extracted across Ethereum and other chains.

Common MEV Strategies

Arbitrage is the most accessible strategy for new bot developers. It exploits price differences between DEXs. When ETH trades at $2,000 on Uniswap and $2,010 on SushiSwap, an arbitrage bot buys low and sells high in a single atomic transaction.

The critical detail: successful MEV extraction requires spotting opportunities, calculating profitability, and submitting transactions within 200ms. Bots operating above this threshold capture significantly fewer opportunities. This is where infrastructure becomes the differentiator.

RPC Infrastructure: The Foundation of MEV Trading

Your RPC endpoint is the single most important infrastructure decision. Standard public endpoints fail for MEV because:

1. Rate limits: Public endpoints like Hyperliquid's limit you to 100 requests per minute
2. Shared resources: "Noisy neighbor" effects cause unpredictable latency spikes
3. No mempool access: Most public endpoints don't expose pending transaction data
4. Higher latency: 200-500ms response times eliminate competitive advantage

Dedicated Nodes vs. Managed RPC Providers

For production MEV: Dedicated nodes pay for themselves after 1-2 successful captures. The economics strongly favor managed dedicated infrastructure over self-hosting for most operations. Providers like Dwellir offer dedicated nodes with co-location options, which larger trading firms use to achieve sub-10ms latency to major networks.

WebSocket vs HTTP for MEV

WebSocket connections are essential for MEV because:

• Real-time mempool monitoring: Subscribe to newPendingTransactions for instant visibility
• No polling overhead: Events arrive immediately without repeated requests
• Persistent connections: Eliminates handshake latency on every call

HTTP endpoints work for execution, but WebSocket is non-negotiable for opportunity detection. Once you have visibility into the mempool, the next challenge is acting on what you see fast enough.

Latency Optimization: Why Milliseconds Matter

The relationship between latency and profit is direct:

Latency Optimization Strategies

1. Co-location: Deploy your bot in the same data center as block builders or validators. This can reduce latency from 50ms to sub-10ms. For institutional trading operations, Dwellir offers co-located infrastructure with dedicated nodes positioned near validator clusters across multiple regions.

2. Geographic distribution: Provider performance varies by region and time. Some excel during US trading hours but degrade during Asian sessions. Consider multi-region deployments for global coverage.

3. Connection pooling: Maintain persistent connections to multiple RPC endpoints. Switch dynamically based on real-time latency measurements.

4. Transaction simulation: Use local simulation (Anvil, REVM) instead of network calls to verify profitability. This reduces RPC calls from 100 to 36 in typical arbitrage scenarios, improving execution time from 5s to under 1s.

With latency optimized, your next decision is which chains to target. The MEV landscape varies significantly across networks.

Chain-by-Chain MEV Landscape

Not all chains are created equal for MEV. Competition levels, block times, and available infrastructure vary significantly.

Ethereum (Chain ID: 1)

Ethereum is the most saturated MEV market. Over $600 million is extracted annually, and opportunities are extremely competitive. New bot developers face steep competition from sophisticated operators with co-located infrastructure.

Best for: Experienced teams with capital for premium infrastructure. Trading firms competing on Ethereum typically require dedicated nodes with enterprise SLAs—providers like Dwellir serve this segment with co-located Ethereum infrastructure and predictable pricing.

HyperEVM/Hyperliquid (Chain ID: 998)

HyperEVM creates unique arbitrage opportunities. Price differences between HyperEVM AMM DEXs and Hyperliquid spot markets create 2-second windows for arbitrage. One documented team generated $5 million profit over 8 months, processing $12.5 billion in volume.

Technical considerations:

• Gas limits require multiple wallets (100+) for high-volume operations
• Maximum 8 arbitrage trades per block recommended
• Transactions prioritized by gasPrice, then nonce

Best for: Teams targeting emerging DeFi ecosystems with specialized infrastructure

For Hyperliquid infrastructure, Dwellir provides managed HyperEVM RPC, orderbook WebSocket, and Hypercore gRPC streaming for real-time trade data.

Monad (Launched 2025)

Monad's parallel execution engine and sub-cent gas fees make it ideal for latency-sensitive strategies. Early entrants face less competition than mature chains.

Unique RPC method: eth_sendRawTransactionSync provides synchronous submission with immediate feedback, which is valuable for bots requiring execution confirmation.

Best for: Early movers targeting high-TPS chains before competition matures

See the Monad RPC providers guide for infrastructure options.

Sonic (formerly Fantom)

Sonic's DAG structure and asynchronous BFT consensus deliver instant finality, compressing MEV windows. Competition shifts from "who sees mempool first" to "who controls ordering at the edge."

Best for: Strategies requiring instant finality

See the Sonic RPC providers guide for options.

Binance Smart Chain (Chain ID: 56)

BSC has an extensive DeFi ecosystem with moderate competition. The native geth client doesn't support bundle submission by default, but bloXroute collaboration enables bundle submission for all validators.

Best for: Teams familiar with EVM targeting larger arbitrage margins than Ethereum

See the BSC RPC providers guide for options.

Base (Chain ID: 8453)

Base has a private mempool, meaning standard mempool monitoring strategies don't work. Just two entities are responsible for 80%+ of MEV extraction on Base, suggesting significant barriers to entry.

Competition level: Very high, dominated by sophisticated players

See the Base RPC providers guide for options.

Polygon (Chain ID: 137)

Polygon's FastLane mechanism introduced sealed-bid auctions, shifting MEV from spam-based to structured auction mechanisms. Only 17 unique searchers were observed in recent research, representing a smaller but sophisticated competition pool.

Best for: Teams comfortable with auction-based MEV mechanisms

See the Polygon RPC providers guide for options.

Arbitrum (Chain ID: 42161)

Arbitrum's 250ms block times require more performance optimization than other chains, but competition is less saturated than Ethereum mainnet. The private mempool limits some strategies.

Best for: Teams optimizing for fast block times with moderate competition

See the Arbitrum RPC providers guide for options.

Chain Selection Summary

Regardless of which chain you choose, protecting your own transactions from front-running is essential.

Private Transactions and MEV Protection

Running an MEV bot creates a paradox: you need to avoid being front-run yourself. Private transaction services solve this.

Flashbots Protect

Flashbots Protect routes your transactions through a private mempool:

• 98.5% success rate with 245ms median response time
• 90% MEV refunds returned to transaction origin
• Full gas refunds on high priority fees
• No charges for reverted transactions

2.1 million Ethereum accounts have protected $43 billion in DEX volume through Flashbots Protect since 2021.

Alternative MEV Protection RPCs

With infrastructure components defined, the next question is cost.

Infrastructure Cost Breakdown

Understanding total cost of ownership helps you budget accurately.

Self-Hosted Infrastructure

Managed RPC Providers

Why Pricing Model Matters for MEV

MEV bots make millions of requests monthly. A single day of testing can exhaust rate-limited free tiers in hours.

Compute unit pricing (Alchemy, QuickNode) charges different multipliers for different RPC methods. eth_call might cost 1 CU, but debug_traceTransaction costs 10+ CU. This creates unpredictable costs for development and production.

Flat-rate pricing (like Dwellir's 1:1 model where 1 response = 1 credit) provides predictable costs regardless of method complexity. For high-volume MEV operations making 100M+ monthly requests, this can mean 40-70% cost savings compared to compute-unit models.

See RPC providers without compute units for a detailed comparison.

Understanding costs helps with budgeting, but execution quality determines success. The following practices separate profitable bots from money-losing ones.

Best Practices for MEV Bot Development

1. Always Simulate Before Submission

Never submit a transaction without simulation. Use local tools to verify profitability after gas costs:

Local simulation reduces external dependencies and catches edge cases before they cost you gas.

2. Implement Multi-Provider Redundancy

Don't rely on a single RPC endpoint. Structure your infrastructure:

Primary RPC -> Fallback RPC 1 -> Fallback RPC 2 -> Circuit Breaker

Use circuit breaker patterns to prevent cascading failures when providers degrade.

3. Optimize Gas Costs

Gas optimization directly impacts profitability:

• Minimize SSTORE operations (20,000 gas each) - use memory variables
• Optimize calldata: 16 gas per non-zero byte vs 4 gas per zero byte
• Batch transactions: Combine swaps via multicall to share 21,000 gas base cost
• Consider low-level languages: Yul provides 4%+ gas reduction vs Solidity

4. Monitor Everything

Essential metrics for MEV operations:

• P50/P95/P99 latency on RPC calls
• Success rate by chain and strategy
• Gas efficiency (actual vs estimated)
• Opportunity capture rate (detected vs executed)

Use Prometheus and Grafana for real-time visibility, and set alerts for latency degradation or success rate drops. With these practices in place, you are ready to deploy.

Getting Started: Infrastructure Checklist

Before deploying your first MEV bot:

• Choose target chain(s) based on competition level and margins
• Set up dedicated RPC with sub-100ms latency
• Configure WebSocket subscriptions for mempool monitoring
• Implement local transaction simulation
• Set up private transaction relay (Flashbots Protect or similar)
• Deploy monitoring and alerting
• Test extensively on testnets before mainnet deployment
• Start with small position sizes and scale gradually

Common Mistakes to Avoid

1. Using rate-limited public RPCs: Public endpoints fail under MEV workloads. Budget for dedicated infrastructure from day one.

2. Underestimating latency requirements: 200ms might seem fast, but it's not competitive for MEV. Target sub-50ms for serious operations.

3. Ignoring gas optimization: A 10% gas improvement across millions of transactions compounds significantly.

4. Skipping simulation: One unverified transaction can cost more than weeks of profits.

5. Single point of failure: Always have fallback infrastructure. Provider outages happen.

Choosing Infrastructure for Production

When evaluating RPC providers for MEV operations, prioritize:

1. Latency: Sub-50ms P95 response times from your deployment region
2. Reliability: 99.9%+ uptime with clear SLA commitments
3. Pricing predictability: Flat-rate or 1:1 credit models avoid cost surprises at scale
4. Chain coverage: Multi-chain support from a single provider simplifies operations

For teams building on chains like Hyperliquid, where orderbook arbitrage requires both EVM RPC and native API access, look for providers offering integrated infrastructure. Dwellir supports 70+ networks with dedicated node options and co-location for latency-sensitive applications.

Ready to test your infrastructure? Start with the Dwellir dashboard or contact the team to discuss dedicated node requirements.

This guide is for educational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. MEV extraction involves significant technical complexity and financial risk. Always conduct thorough testing and never deploy capital you cannot afford to lose.