Public Client

A Public Client is an interface to "public" JSON-RPC API methods such as retrieving block numbers, transactions, reading from smart contracts, etc through Public Actions.

The createPublicClient function sets up a Public Client with a given Transport configured for a Chain.

Import

import { createPublicClient } from 'viem'

Usage

Initialize a Client with your desired Chain (e.g. mainnet) and Transport (e.g. http).

import { createPublicClient, http } from 'viem'
import { mainnet } from 'viem/chains'
 
const publicClient = createPublicClient({ 
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http()
})

Then you can consume Public Actions:

const blockNumber = await publicClient.getBlockNumber() 

Optimization

The Public Client also supports eth_call Aggregation for improved performance.

eth_call Aggregation (via Multicall)

The Public Client supports the aggregation of eth_call requests into a single multicall (aggregate3) request.

This means for every Action that utilizes an eth_call request (ie. readContract), the Public Client will batch the requests (over a timed period) and send it to the RPC Provider in a single multicall request. This can dramatically improve network performance, and decrease the amount of Compute Units (CU) used by RPC Providers like Alchemy, Infura, etc.

The Public Client schedules the aggregation of eth_call requests over a given time period. By default, it executes the batch request at the end of the current JavaScript message queue (a zero delay), however, consumers can specify a custom wait period (in ms).

You can enable eth_call aggregation by setting the batch.multicall flag to true:

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  batch: {
    multicall: true, 
  },
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http(),
})

You can also customize the multicall options.

Now, when you start to utilize readContract Actions, the Public Client will batch and send over those requests at the end of the message queue (or custom time period) in a single eth_call multicall request:

import { getContract } from 'viem'
import { abi } from './abi'
import { publicClient } from './client'
 
const contract = getContract({ address, abi, client: publicClient })
 
// The below will send a single request to the RPC Provider.
const [name, totalSupply, symbol, balance] = await Promise.all([
  contract.read.name(),
  contract.read.totalSupply(),
  contract.read.symbol(),
  contract.read.balanceOf([address]),
])

Read more on Contract Instances.

Parameters

transport

• Type: Transport

The Transport of the Public Client.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http(), 
})

chain (optional)

• Type: Chain

The Chain of the Public Client.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  chain: mainnet, 
  transport: http(),
})

batch (optional)

Flags for batch settings.

batch.multicall (optional)

• Type: boolean | MulticallBatchOptions
• Default: false

Toggle to enable eth_call multicall aggregation.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  batch: {
    multicall: true, 
  },
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http(),
})

batch.multicall.batchSize (optional)

• Type: number
• Default: 1_024

The maximum size (in bytes) for each multicall (aggregate3) calldata chunk.

Note: Some RPC Providers limit the amount of calldata that can be sent in a single request. It is best to check with your RPC Provider to see if there are any calldata size limits to eth_call requests.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  batch: {
    multicall: {
      batchSize: 512, 
    },
  },
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http(),
})

batch.multicall.wait (optional)

• Type: number
• Default: 0 (zero delay)

The maximum number of milliseconds to wait before sending a batch.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  batch: {
    multicall: {
      wait: 16, 
    },
  },
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http(),
})

cacheTime (optional)

• Type: number
• Default: client.pollingInterval

Time (in ms) that cached data will remain in memory.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  cacheTime: 10_000, 
  chain: mainnet,
  transport: http(),
})

key (optional)

• Type: string
• Default: "public"

A key for the Client.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  chain: mainnet,
  key: 'public', 
  transport: http(),
})

name (optional)

• Type: string
• Default: "Public Client"

A name for the Client.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  chain: mainnet,
  name: 'Public Client', 
  transport: http(),
})

pollingInterval (optional)

• Type: number
• Default: 4_000

Frequency (in ms) for polling enabled Actions.

const publicClient = createPublicClient({
  chain: mainnet,
  pollingInterval: 10_000, 
  transport: http(),
})

Live Example

Check out the usage of createPublicClient in the live Public Client Example below.