Fastest L2 block time, live across Robinhood, Arbitrum, Base and 7 more
BlockchainsArbitrum
Leads345 ms
- p99
- 834 ms
- rank
- #2
- samples
- 312,790
Base
Trails1.97 s
- p99
- 2.99 s
- rank
- #5
- samples
- 42,738
Block time
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Arbitrum vs Base
Arbitrum leads on 5 of 7 shared benchmarks, Base on 2. Arbitrum wins on Fastest L2 block time, live across Robinhood, Arbitrum, Base and 7 more (345 ms vs 1.97 s), Fastest free public RPC for Ethereum, BNB, Polygon and 23 more chains (135 ms vs 137 ms), Fastest Chainlink CCIP source chain by end-to-end delivery latency (17.6 min vs 23.1 min), Fastest LayerZero source chain by end-to-end message delivery (26.07 s vs 1.0 min). Base wins on Cheapest blockchain transaction fee, live across L1 and L2 chains ($0.000343 vs $0.00116), Fastest Wormhole VAA finalization by source chain, live latency (25.00 s vs 17.3 min). Data as of 2026-09-24 UTC.
Arbitrum
Optimistic rollup built on Nitro stack with a fast-finality sequencer. Sub-second block times (~250 ms) via a 250 ms default block interval, far below the 2 s OP Stack convention. 7-day fraud-proof window for L1 finality.
Base
Coinbase-operated optimistic rollup on the OP Stack. 2-second sequencer block time, shared bridge with Optimism via the OP Superchain, fastest-growing L2 by TVL since 2024.
Side by side measurements
Fastest free public RPC for Ethereum, BNB, Polygon and 23 more chains (plus Solana and Polkadot)
RPCsArbitrum
Leads135 ms
- p99
- 749 ms
- rank
- #5
- samples
- 4,319
Base
Trails137 ms
- p99
- 268 ms
- rank
- #6
- samples
- 4,319
RPC latency
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Latency is conditional on success: the harness times only calls returning a valid fresh block, so a mostly-failing endpoint can post a fast p50. Rows below 50 percent success are degraded; unresponsive probes pin below the table. The All chains aggregate favours single-chain foundation endpoints (Base, Binance, Arbitrum, Optimism, Avalanche officials) since they rank on one chain only; use a chain tab for honest comparison. Dead endpoints (cloudflare-eth POST returns -32603) are excluded.
Cheapest blockchain transaction fee, live across L1 and L2 chains
BlockchainsArbitrum
Trails$0.00116
- p99
- $0.00212
- rank
- #11
- samples
- 20,160
Base
Leads$0.000343
- p99
- $0.00744
- rank
- #6
- samples
- 20,160
Native transfer fee USD
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Most reliable free public RPC, correctness incidents across 7 EVM chains
RPCsArbitrum
No data in window
Base
Trails1
- rank
- #4
- samples
- 84provisional
Reliability incidents
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
A zero row means no incident was caught in the window, not a proof of correctness. Most providers post zero most days; this bench exists for the days they do not, and for the errors: a blocked eth_getLogs or a balance read gated behind a paid key at 40 blocks of depth counts as an incident because it is one from the caller's seat.
Fastest Wormhole VAA finalization by source chain, live latency
BridgesArbitrum
Trails17.3 min
- rank
- #10
- samples
- 17provisional
Base
Leads25.00 s
- rank
- #8
- samples
- 13provisional
VAA finalization
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Fastest Chainlink CCIP source chain by end-to-end delivery latency
BridgesArbitrum
Leads17.6 min
- rank
- #13
- samples
- 65provisional
Base
Trails23.1 min
- p99
- 37.8 min
- rank
- #14
- samples
- 276
CCIP delivery
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Fastest LayerZero source chain by end-to-end message delivery
BridgesArbitrum
Leads26.07 s
- p99
- 27.4 min
- rank
- #3
- samples
- 1,310
Base
Trails1.0 min
- p99
- 2.0 min
- rank
- #13
- samples
- 1,134
LayerZero delivery
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Fastest Axelar GMP source chain by end-to-end delivery
BridgesArbitrum
Leads22.0 min
- rank
- #6
- samples
- 16provisional
Base
Trails25.2 min
- rank
- #8
- samples
- 33provisional
Axelar GMP delivery
Arbitrumn/aBasen/a
Frequently asked questions
Arbitrum vs Base: which one is better?
Arbitrum and Base are compared on 8 shared OpenChainBench benchmarks. Arbitrum leads on Fastest L2 block time, live across Robinhood, Arbitrum, Base and 7 more. Base leads on Cheapest blockchain transaction fee, live across L1 and L2 chains. See the live table on this page for every metric.
Which is faster, Arbitrum or Base?
On the Fastest L2 block time, live across Robinhood, Arbitrum, Base and 7 more benchmark, Arbitrum leads at 345 ms versus Base at 1.97 s. Live measurement is updated continuously by the OpenChainBench harness.
Which is cheaper, Arbitrum or Base?
On the Cheapest blockchain transaction fee, live across L1 and L2 chains benchmark, Base leads at $0.000343 versus Arbitrum at $0.00116. Live measurement is updated continuously by the OpenChainBench harness.
How is the Arbitrum vs Base comparison measured?
Every benchmark on this page uses the same open methodology, published at https://openchainbench.com/methodology. Data is CC-BY-4.0. Measurement harnesses are MIT-licensed.
Related comparisons
How this pair was selected
Auto-generated pairs require: both providers in the same benchmark for seven consecutive days, at least 1000 samples per provider, observable third-party search demand, and a public /products/[slug] page on OCB. Editorially curated pairs (like this one) may publish early when search demand is high and data is accruing; panels with fewer than 100 samples are shown as provisional. The full pair ledger is versioned in the public repo.