Q3 2026 on The Graph: The Network Is the Product
Subgraphs made The Graph the standard for querying blockchain data. The Graph Network is what keeps them running: independent Indexers around the world who sync Subgraphs, serve their queries and stand behind the data.
For a long time, the network's traffic and economics did not fully reflect that. A large share of developer queries ran through a centralized staging environment that network Indexers never saw. Indexing rewards followed stake and signal rather than the quality of service provided to consumers.
In Q3, The Graph started putting its growth behind the network more than ever before. The Graph Foundation changed its job to make that happen. It stepped in as an operator, funded by the Innovation Allocation. In its new role, The Foundation supports chains, Delegators and a newly reinvigorated Graph Office Hours. It coordinates between the developers and data consumers who need data and the Indexers and Delegators who serve and secure it. But, more than anything, that team aims to empower its providers and consumers to grow.
Here is what happened in Q3 2026 in The Graph ecosystem.
1. Developer Traffic Belongs on the Network
Subgraph Studio has historically given developers a staging environment. Over time, production traffic also settled there, served by a centralized Upgrade Indexer instead of the network. The traffic that most needed redundancy was the traffic least likely to have it.
That traffic is now moving to The Graph Network in stages, starting with BNB Smart Chain and Polygon, where Studio staging queries end on October 8, 2026. There, Indexers serve those queries and collect the query fees.
For developers, the steps are straight-forward:
- Already published to the Network: nothing changes.
- Still on the Studio staging endpoint for these chains: publish before October 8th, set up billing and an API key in Studio, and switch to a Gateway endpoint.
The Foundation will curate newly published Subgraphs on those chains with an automated bot until October 8th, ensuring Indexers have a clear signal of which Subgraphs are important during the transition. At Indexers' request, it will also publish the full list of Subgraphs it curates. Studio remains the place to manage Subgraph versions, billing, and API keys. Subgraphs on other chains are expected to follow, starting with chains already supported by protocol issuance.
2. Indexers Who Serve Now Earn
Bringing traffic to the network matters only if the network pays the people who serve it. Indexing rewards used to be distributed by curation signal and allocated stake, and neither measured whether an Indexer served any queries – let alone with sufficient quality. In 2025, 15.2% of indexing rewards went to Indexers that were not delivering value to the network.
The Rewards Eligibility Oracle (REO) changes the condition. An Indexer stays eligible by serving at least one qualifying query on five or more days in a rolling 28-day window. A qualifying query:
- returns HTTP 200 in under 5,000 ms
- comes from an Indexer within 50,000 blocks of chainhead
- hits a Subgraph with at least 500 GRT in curation signal
Eligibility renews on-chain daily and lasts 14 days. Total issuance does not change. What changes is who receives it.
At this point, the bar is low on purpose, but that will be short-lived. When the dashboard was first published, 49 of the 97 listed Indexers were already eligible (as of the REO launch post). An Indexer serving real traffic clears the standard without noticing it.
The design also protects the people it measures. Rewards are withheld, not confiscated. The rules are published, the code is open, and changes come with roughly 14 days' notice. If the oracle stops posting for seven days, every Indexer is treated as eligible.
Announced on September 22nd, the first round of tightening, which requires Indexers to begin indexing at least five qualifying Subgraphs per active day, went to Indexers with full notice.
For Delegators, stake follows its Indexer. The shows every Indexer's status and streak, updated daily. If your Indexer has been impacted by REO, your rewards will also be impacted. You can move your delegation to another Indexer or learn more about The Graph’s new Liquid Staking Initiative below.
3. The Graph Foundation Has a New Mandate
Both changes above needed someone to own the parts of the network that sat between teams. The Graph Foundation has moved from coordinating and funding third-party roadmaps to operating the network directly. It now runs the Subgraph Gateway, Subgraph Studio, and Graph Explorer with new engineers from GraphOps and Edge & Node joining the Foundation to run network infrastructure and own the protocol work.
The shift is in what the Foundation treats as the product. The network comes first. The Foundation's role is to keep four groups pointed at the same place:
- Developers who build on the network
- Data consumers who query it
- Indexers who serve it
- Delegators who secure it
In practice, that means playing a more active role in running network components, curating so Indexers pick up new demand, setting service standards so rewards follow the work, and talking to all four groups in the open every week.
4. The Innovation Allocation Funds the Operator
Alongside the Foundation’s new role comes a new approach to budgeting for protocol innovation. GIP-0089, approved by The Graph Council, directs 20% of protocol issuance to a Foundation-managed Innovation Allocation. That funds the work of running and growing the network including:
- operational continuity
- a unified product experience
- onboarding new data service providers
- chain integrations
The Foundation and its budget remain accountable to The Graph Council.
5. More Chains Coming to The Graph
Chain support is one of the clearest places the operator role shows up. Chain integration deals moved to the Foundation this quarter, and new support landed. All of it is verified against a newly-implemented page with dedicated landing pages for each chain:
- : Subgraphs, with InfraDAO as backstop Indexer for published Subgraphs with 500+ GRT in signal.
- : Firehose and Substreams with extended blocks, alongside Subgraphs.
- : Firehose and Substreams upgraded to extended blocks.
- : Firehose and Substreams with extended blocks.
- : additional Firehose and Substreams providers with testnet support.
Extended blocks carry what a standard RPC endpoint leaves out: internal calls, balance changes, storage diffs, and code changes. A router that moves funds through an internal call, or a contract that changes state without emitting an event, becomes visible. Pinax operates the Arc, HyperEVM, and Ink endpoints while also handling the Extended Blocks integrations.
6. Graph Office Hours is Where Coordination Happens
Indexer Office Hours was rebranded as Graph Office Hours. It is one weekly call where Indexers, Developers, Delegators and the Foundation work through changes in the open, getting feedback from the ecosystem’s most dedicated stakeholders. GOH runs every Tuesday at 1700 UTC in The Graph . This quarter's calls covered the new mandate, the Studio migration, REO criteria and chain integrations. The quarter's recordings are on :
- : The Graph Foundation's new mandate
- : Q&A on The Foundation's new mandate, last session of Indexer Office Hours
- : New format with new Foundation team announcement, Studio migration plans, REO criteria, and DIPs update
- : Chain integrations, Studio updates, REO discussion, Liquid Staking plans
- : Chain integrations, BSC/Polygon announcement, REO discussion
- : Chain integrations, BSC/Polygon Curation plans, REO impacts so far
7. A Liquid Option for Delegators
Delegators secure the network, but staked GRT has historically sat idle for other purposes. The GRT Liquid Staking Initiative turns a staked position on The Graph protocol into stGRT, a liquid token that represents the stake and its accrued rewards.
- The vault was deployed by Avantgarde Finance on Enzyme vault tooling, and the Foundation manages it.
- Phase 1 includes a small soft launch for existing holders.
- A wider rollout for Delegators is slated to follows in the coming weeks.
- Early access requests go to .
Informational only. This is not financial, investment, legal or tax advice. Rewards are variable, and features are subject to governance.
8. Hosted Sinks & Hosted Stores: Data Where Consumers Need it
Data consumers want indexed data in their own systems, without running infrastructure to get it there. Two managed Substreams services on The Graph Market now cover both directions.
Hosted Stores (beta) is a managed, block-aware key/value store. Data goes in over gRPC from your own service or from a Substreams package. Any module can look up a value at any block height. That covers the lookups most pipelines end up hand-building:
- resolving token metadata
- mapping an address to its owner or protocol
- checking an allowlist
- attaching an off-chain price to an on-chain event
Hosted Sinks (beta) now offers users GraphQL. A sink can expose a read-only GraphQL API and console over the database it writes into, turned on with one checkbox. Teams moving from a Subgraph to Substreams keep the GraphQL interface they already use.
Other developer tools shipped alongside:
- Substreams Skills: nine guided skills for AI coding assistants. substreams-convert maps a Subgraph's entities and handlers to Substreams modules.
- Substreams v1.21.0 to v1.23.0: the SQL sink moved into the main CLI, Postgres sink fixes landed, and a new setting ends long-running requests gracefully.
- graph-node v0.45.0: background index builds and a new ethereum.decodeParams host function. It also includes one breaking environment-variable rename for Indexers.
9. Builders Took Their Tools to New Heights
At ETHOnline 2026, builders sent 354 submissions into The Graph's three tracks, and nine projects shared $15,000. Several winners built things the next team can use:
Composable or Standardized Graph Products
- : a prediction market for DeFi fundamentals with one query across 28 lending deployments.
- : joins nine Subgraph deployments inside a TEE to surface hidden cross-protocol leverage.
- : a data marketplace for agents that refunds the buyer when data is stale.
AI Tooling, From Scratch
- : a bonded watch over a lending position across 13 protocols.
- : pay-per-call on-chain analysis for agents built on an ERC-8004 Substreams module.
- : a risk verdict before an agent signs with the age of the evidence behind it.
- : fair prices for tokenized stocks across five venues and four chains.
AI Tooling, Continuity
- : agent-run stablecoin FX strategies on Arc, benchmarked against 12 Subgraphs.
- : encrypted agent messaging, grounded in standardized DEX Subgraphs.
What to Watch for Next in The Graph Ecosystem
- More chains leaving Studio staging and moving onto the network.
- Direct Indexer Payments: The contracts are deployed and dormant. When activated, the Foundation and Gateway Operators can pay Indexers directly to index specific data.
- REO criteria: Each step will come with published criteria and notice.
- Liquid Staking: A wider rollout to Delegators.
- Graph Office Hours: Every Tuesday at 1700 UTC and the fastest way to be heard on all of the above.
About The Graph
The Graph is a suite of blockchain data infrastructure products that extract, process, and deliver scalable blockchain data solutions across 60+ networks. The Graph enables application developers, data analysts, AI agents, and enterprise teams that need structured, real-time access to blockchain data. Products include Subgraphs, Firehose, Substreams, and Amp. As of early 2026, The Graph has served over 1.27 trillion queries to more than 75,000 projects, powered by a network of independent Indexers around the world.
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