This compatibility report describes conformance tests and compares benchmarks between Forest and Lotus. As demonstrated by the results below, Forest is a reliable and high-performance alternative to Lotus.

We continuously validate this through conformance testing and RPC benchmarks, with results published for independent verification.

Conformance Tests

During conformance testing, Forest RPC responses are compared against Lotus responses for identical input parameters.

Used configuration

Forest: v0.30.4 "DeLorean"

Lotus: v1.34.3

Validation Policies

We use the following validation policies:

• basic: Validates that the endpoint exists and that both Lotus and Forest responses follow the same JSON schema;
• identity: Validates that Forest returns exactly the same JSON as Lotus;
• custom: Applies method-specific semantic validation across both responses.

The basic policy exists for a concrete reason: some RPC methods are inherently non-deterministic for a given parameter set. For example, responses that depend on the transient state of a node (such as currently connected peers) cannot be expected to match exactly across implementations. In these cases, strict identity checks are meaningless, but schema-level correctness is still valuable.

The custom policy is used when responses are not expected to be identical, but still need to satisfy method-specific semantic invariants. The validation logic is implemented directly in code and lives in src/tool/subcommands/api_cmd/api_compare_tests.rs.

Conformance Tests Results

Conformance Test Results

Benchmarks

Used configuration

Forest: v0.30.4 "DeLorean"