Ankr launches institutional-grade RPC infrastructure for XRP Ledger

Ankr has rolled out Remote Procedure Call infrastructure for the XRP Ledger, giving developers and institutions a way to interact with the network without spinning up their own nodes. The service, built in partnership with the XRP Ledger Foundation, supports 43 methods across both mainnet and testnet environments.

Think of RPC infrastructure as the plumbing behind blockchain applications. Every time a wallet checks a balance, a DEX executes a trade, or a payment app settles a cross-border transaction, an RPC call is what actually queries the network. Running that plumbing yourself is expensive and complicated. Ankr is now handling it for XRPL builders.

What Ankr is actually offering

The deployment includes nodes strategically placed in four locations: Singapore, New York, Amsterdam, and San Francisco. That geographic spread matters for latency, the milliseconds-level delays that can make or break high-frequency financial applications.

Ankr is framing this as “institutional-grade” infrastructure, a label that hinges on one key feature: verifiable node responses. This aligns with Ankr’s broader vRPC product line, which essentially lets users cryptographically verify that the data they’re getting from a node hasn’t been tampered with.

The 43 supported methods cover native XRPL functionalities including payment channels, decentralized exchange operations, and cross-currency settlements.

On the pricing side, Ankr is running a freemium model. The free plan allows up to 30 requests per second, which is generous enough for testing and smaller-scale applications but would likely require an upgrade for any serious production workload. Premium tiers with dedicated endpoints are aimed at enterprise customers who need guaranteed uptime and higher throughput.

Why this matters for XRPL’s developer ecosystem

The XRP Ledger has long positioned itself as infrastructure for fast and cost-efficient payments and asset transfers. But having a capable blockchain is only half the equation. Developers need accessible tooling to actually build on it.

Running your own xrpld node, the software that powers the XRP Ledger, requires server resources, ongoing maintenance, and monitoring. For a startup or even a mid-size fintech exploring XRPL integration, that operational overhead can be a significant barrier. Third-party RPC providers like Ankr essentially eliminate that friction.

The partnership with the XRP Ledger Foundation adds institutional credibility to the rollout. Rather than a third-party simply offering an unaffiliated service, this is a coordinated effort to improve the network’s accessibility from the foundation level up.

Timing and the road ahead

The launch timing is notable. Ankr’s RPC service arrives just ahead of the anticipated xrpld version 3.3.0 upgrade, which proposes five amendments focused on privacy, settlement capabilities, and institutional features.

The initial market reaction to the announcement has been muted, with no significant price movement in XRP following the news. Traders price in user-facing products and protocol upgrades. They rarely get excited about plumbing, even when the plumbing is what makes everything else possible.

For Ankr, the XRPL integration extends its multi-chain strategy. The company already provides RPC services across numerous blockchain networks, and adding XRP Ledger support broadens its addressable market while deepening its relationship with institutional crypto users who may already be exploring Ripple’s ecosystem for payment use cases.