To use the Starknet API you'll need to create a free Alchemy account first!

Introduction

Starknet is a decentralized Validity-Rollup (often referred to as ZK-Rollup). It operates as a Layer 2 network over Ethereum, enabling any app to achieve massive scale without compromising Ethereum's composability and security.

What is Starknet API?

The Starknet API is a collection of JSON-RPC methods that allow developers to interact with the Starknet network. By using the endpoints provided by the API, developers can access up-to-date network data and submit transactions to it.

Getting Started Instructions

1. Choose a Package Manager (npm or yarn)

Before you begin, you'll need to choose a package manager to manage dependencies in your project. The two most popular package managers for Node.js are npm and yarn. You can choose the one you're most comfortable with.

npm

To get started with npm, follow the documentation to install Node.js and npm for your operating system: https://docs.npmjs.com/downloading-and-installing-node-js-and-npm

yarn

To get started with yarn, follow these steps: https://classic.yarnpkg.com/lang/en/docs/install

2. Set up your project (npm or yarn)

Let's start by setting up a simple Node.js project. Open your terminal and run the following commands:

mkdir alchemy-starknet-api
cd alchemy-starknet-api
npm init --yes

mkdir alchemy-starknet-api
cd alchemy-starknet-api
yarn init --yes

This will create a new directory called alchemy-starknet-api and initialize a new Node.js project in it.

3. Make Your First Request

To make requests to the Starknet API, you'll need to use an HTTP client. In this guide, we'll use Axios, a popular HTTP client for Node.js. Install Axios as a dependency in your project with the command below:

npm install axios

yarn add axios

Next, let's create a script that will make a request to the starknet_blockNumber JSON-RPC method on Starknet. Create a new file called index.js in your project directory and add the following code:

const axios = require('axios');

const apiKey = 'YOUR_API_KEY'; // Replace with your Alchemy API key
const url = `https://starknet-mainnet.g.alchemy.com/v2/${apiKey}`;

const payload = {
  jsonrpc: '2.0',
  id: 1,
  method: 'starknet_blockNumber',
  params: []
};

axios.post(url, payload)
  .then(response => {
    console.log('Block Number:', response.data.result);
  })
  .catch(error => {
    console.error(error);
  });

Remember to replace YOUR_API_KEY with your actual Alchemy API key that you can get from your Alchemy dashboard.

4. Run Script

To run the script and make the request to the Starknet API, execute the following command in your terminal:

node index.js

As a result, should see the current block number on Starknet printed to the console!

Block Number: 42390

Next Steps

Congratulations! You've successfully made your first request to the Starknet API using Alchemy. From here, you can explore the various JSON-RPC methods available on Starknet and start building your decentralized applications on it!