Exploring the Stake Account Page on Solscan

When you stake SOL to a validator, your coins do not sit in your wallet - a separate stake account is created to hold them, and it has its own page on Solscan. That page is where you check that your stake is actually earning, which validator it went to, and who is allowed to move it. Think of it as a fixed-term deposit slip: your name is on it, the money is yours, but it lives in its own envelope with its own terms.

What does State mean?

Four values, and they all turn on the epoch - Solana's two-day accounting period. Activating means you have chosen a validator and the stake starts earning at the beginning of the next epoch. Active means it is earning now. Deactivating means you have asked to unstake and it stops at the end of the current epoch. Inactive means it is earning nothing and can be withdrawn. Nothing here happens instantly: both joining and leaving wait for an epoch boundary, so a day or two of patience is normal and not a fault.

Why are there three stake numbers?

• Delegated stake - the total you pointed at the validator.
• Active stake - the part actually earning right now.
• Inactive stake - the part in warmup or cooldown, earning nothing yet.

If rewards look smaller than expected, compare delegated with active: rewards only ever accrue on the active figure. The page also shows a Rent Reserve, around 0.00228 SOL, which the account must hold to exist on Solana at all. You get it back when you close the account.

Who controls the account?

Two authorities, listed under More info, and they can be different wallets. The staking authority can delegate, undelegate, split and merge. The withdraw authority can take the coins out, but only once they are inactive - active stake cannot be withdrawn, which is the protection that makes staking safe to leave alone. The Validator field names who you delegated to, and the Rewards tab shows what arrived at the end of each epoch.

Check the Rewards tab once a week rather than once a day - rewards land per epoch, so a daily look just shows you the same number twice. Next: what Solscan is and how to read it and how to read a Solana transaction.