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Block explorer

Difficulty: Hard Tested v0.18.5.3

onion-monero-blockchain-explorer (xmrblocks) is a self-hosted Monero block explorer. It reads your node's database directly, so lookups never leave your home. It can also decode outputs with a view key and check payment proofs, all privately.

Why it's rated Hard

The explorer must be compiled against the Monero source code, so you build Monero too. This takes 30–90 minutes, needs ~4 GB of RAM (add swap if needed), and every Monero upgrade means rebuilding both. Sometimes the explorer lags behind new Monero releases.

Ubuntu 26.04

Ubuntu 26.04 ships CMake 4 and Boost 1.90, both newer than most Monero tooling was written for. The explorer's build files were updated for them, but at the time of writing there's an open report that its master branch fails to compile. Check that issue before you start.

Requirements

  • 2.1 Monero node synced
  • ~10 GB of free disk space for the source code and build

Build dependencies

Install the packages from the Monero build guide for Ubuntu, as shown in the moneroexamples compilation guide. For Ubuntu 26.04:

sudo apt install -y build-essential cmake pkg-config libssl-dev libzmq3-dev libunbound-dev \
  libsodium-dev libunwind-dev liblzma-dev libreadline-dev libexpat1-dev libpgm-dev \
  libhidapi-dev libusb-1.0-0-dev libprotobuf-dev protobuf-compiler libudev-dev \
  libboost-all-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev git

Build Monero and the explorer

The explorer must read the blockchain as the monero user, so build it as that user:

sudo su - monero

Build Monero (the cmake step of the explorer looks for it in ~/monero by default):

git clone --recursive -b v0.18.5.3 https://github.com/monero-project/monero.git ~/monero
cd ~/monero
USE_SINGLE_BUILDDIR=1 make -j$(nproc)

Build the explorer:

cd ~
git clone https://github.com/moneroexamples/onion-monero-blockchain-explorer.git
cd onion-monero-blockchain-explorer
mkdir build && cd build
cmake ..
make -j$(nproc)
exit

Autostart on boot

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/xmrblocks.service

# MoneroBox: systemd unit for the Monero block explorer
# /etc/systemd/system/xmrblocks.service

[Unit]
Description=Monero block explorer (xmrblocks)
Requires=monerod.service
After=monerod.service

[Service]
User=monero
Group=monero
Type=simple
WorkingDirectory=/home/monero/onion-monero-blockchain-explorer/build
ExecStart=/home/monero/onion-monero-blockchain-explorer/build/xmrblocks \
  --bc-path=/data/monero/lmdb \
  --daemon-url=http://127.0.0.1:18081 \
  --port=8081 \
  --enable-json-api \
  --enable-autorefresh-option
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=30

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Note

Run xmrblocks --help to check the options of the version you built. Add --enable-pusher to be able to broadcast signed transactions, or --enable-emission-monitor to track the total supply.

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now xmrblocks
journalctl -fu xmrblocks

Access

The explorer listens on all interfaces. Open its port in the firewall:

sudo ufw allow 8081/tcp comment 'Block explorer'

Open http://NODE_IP:8081 in your browser.

Over Tor

Add another onion service in /etc/tor/torrc, like in 2.2: 

HiddenServiceDir /var/lib/tor/xmrblocks/
HiddenServicePort 80 127.0.0.1:8081

Upgrade

After every Monero upgrade, as monero: git fetch --tags && git checkout vNEW && git submodule update --init --force in ~/monero, rebuild it, then git pull and rebuild the explorer, and finally restart xmrblocks.