Introduction
The Radix Core API is a low-level API exposed directly by Radix full nodes, providing raw access to ledger state, transaction submission, consensus status, and node management. Unlike the Gateway API which is designed for dApp developers, the Core API is primarily used by infrastructure operators, Gateway providers, and tools that need direct node communication.
Architecture
The Core API runs on every Radix full node and provides the lowest-level programmatic access to the network. The Gateway API is built on top of the Core API — it ingests data from Core API endpoints, indexes it into a PostgreSQL database, and exposes a higher-level query interface.
Key capabilities:
- Raw ledger streaming — access committed transactions as they are finalised
- Transaction construction — low-level transaction building and submission
- Mempool inspection — view pending transactions
- Node status — consensus health, sync status, peer information
- State queries — direct access to the Substate Model
Most dApp developers should use the Gateway API or the TypeScript SDK rather than the Core API directly, as the Gateway provides pagination, indexing, and a more convenient query model.
External Links
- Network APIs — Radix Documentation
- babylon-node — GitHub Repository
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