Glossary / Solana Core
Solana's measurement of transaction execution cost — analogous to gas on Ethereum, but paid in SOL priority fees.
Every Solana transaction consumes compute units (CUs) based on the operations it performs. A simple SOL transfer uses ~450 CUs; a Raydium swap can use 200,000+ CUs. Each transaction has a max CU limit and can pay priority fees per CU to prioritize inclusion.
Programs that use excessive CUs may fail if they exceed the transaction limit. Solana developers optimize CU usage by minimizing account writes and using efficient program instructions.
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