eth_getTransactionCount

eth_getTransactionCount returns the number of transactions an address has sent, which is the account's nonce — the value you must set on the next transaction you submit. On Base, Coinbase's OP Stack optimistic rollup that settles to Ethereum L1 and pays gas in ETH, the ~2s block cadence means the confirmed nonce advances fast, so wallets and relayers lean on this call to stay in sync. Send it to https://base.therpc.io/YOUR_API_KEY (chain ID 8453, hex 0x2105) with an address and a block tag. The result is the hex-encoded count of confirmed transactions from that address at the chosen block.

Use cases

• Get the next nonce to set when building a transaction to broadcast on Base — query with the pending tag so queued sends are counted.
• Detect stuck transactions by comparing the latest nonce with the pending nonce: a gap means something is sitting unconfirmed in the mempool.
• Batch many sends in a row by reading the nonce once and incrementing it locally for each transaction instead of re-querying per send.
• Study an account's activity over time by reading its nonce at historical Base blocks (requires an archive node).

Parameters

Response

Example request

1curl https://base.therpc.io/YOUR_API_KEY \
2  -X POST \
3  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
4  -d '{
5    "jsonrpc": "2.0",
6    "method": "eth_getTransactionCount",
7    "params": [
8        "0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000",
9        "latest"
10      ],
11    "id": 1
12  }'

Try it live in the Base playground.

Errors & troubleshooting

Common pitfalls

• When firing transactions back-to-back, query with pending; latest only counts mined transactions and will hand the same nonce to each send, causing collisions.
• A nonce gap (submitting N+1 before N confirms) leaves the later transaction queued indefinitely on Base — the sequencer will not process it until the gap is filled.
• For contract accounts the nonce counts contract creations via CREATE, not ordinary calls, so it advances only when the contract deploys another contract.

Supported networks

• Mainnet — Chain ID: 8453
• Sepolia — Chain ID: 84532

See also

• eth_sendRawTransaction
• eth_getTransactionByHash
• eth_getBalance

1curl https://base.therpc.io/YOUR_API_KEY \
2  -X POST \
3  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
4  -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"eth_getTransactionCount","params":["0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000",""]}'