Using wallets on EVM networks

You can use Privy server wallets to sign messages and execute transactions on any EVM-compatible network, like Ethereum, Base, or Arbitrum.

Using the SDK

TIP

If you're familiar with the viem library for using wallets on EVM networks, you can integrate Privy server wallets directly with viem.

To execute an EVM action with a server wallet, use the methods on PrivyClient's walletApi.ethereum class.

There are currently four supported EVM actions: signMessage, signTypedData, signTransaction, and sendTransaction. View the parameters required for each method and examples below.

INFO

The walletApi.ethereum methods above respectively correspond to the EIP1193 personal_sign, eth_signTypedData_v4, eth_signTransaction, and eth_sendTransaction methods.

Field	Type	Description
walletId	string	Unique ID of the wallet to take actions with.
idempotencyKey	string	(Optional) Idempotency key to identify a unique request.
message	string | Uint8Array	The string or bytes to sign with the wallet.

const {data} = await privy.walletApi.ethereum.signMessage({
  walletId: 'insert-wallet-id',
  message: 'Hello world',
});
// Get the signature and encoding from the response
const {signature, encoding} = data;

Using the REST API

To request a signature or transaction from an Ethereum wallet, make a POST request to:

https://api.privy.io/v1/wallets/<wallet_id>/rpc

TIP

In the request headers, make sure to include Privy's required authentication headers and headers that may be required for your app's wallet API setup.

Body

In the body of the request, include the following fields. Make sure to follow the appropriate guidance for the action you'd like to take with the wallet (signing messages, signing typed data, signing transactions, or signing and broadcasting transactions).

Field	Type	Description
method	'personal_sign'	RPC method to execute with the wallet.
params	Object	Parameters for the RPC method to execute with the wallet.
params.message	string	The message to sign with the wallet. If the message to sign is raw bytes, you must serialize the message as a hexadecimal string.
params.encoding	'utf-8' | 'hex'	The encoding format for params.message. Use utf-8 for a string message and hex for bytes.

Response

If the action is allowed, Privy will send the following fields in the response body:

Field	Type	Description
method	'personal_sign'	The RPC method executed with the wallet.
data	Object	Outputs for the RPC method executed with the wallet.
data.signature	string	An encoded string serializing the signature produced by the user's wallet.
data.encoding	'hex'	The encoding format for the returned signature. Currently, only 'hex' is supported for Ethereum.

Examples

As an example, a sample request to take a delegated action with a wallet might look like the following:

$ curl --request POST https://api.privy.io/v1/wallets/<wallet_id>/rpc \
-u "<your-privy-app-id>:<your-privy-app-secret>" \
-H "privy-app-id: <your-privy-app-id>" \
-H "privy-authorization-signature: <authorization-signature-for-request>" \
-H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
-d '{
  "chain_type": "ethereum",
  "method": "personal_sign",
  "params": {
    "message": "Hello, Ethereum.",
    "encoding": "utf-8"
  }
}'

A successful response will look like the following:

{
  "method": "personal_sign",
  "data": {
    "signature": "0x28eac519bf4051a624d4246a5788667baf84dcd7d2a439b314b339013b5cdb4c",
    "encoding": "hex"
  }
}

Using viem

viem is a popular TypeScript library on EVM for executing onchain actions with wallets. Privy's server wallets on EVM natively integrate with viem, allowing you to use the library's interfaces for signing messages, signing typed data, sending transactions, and more.

To integrate with viem, first install version 2^ of the library as a peer dependency:

npm i viem@latest

Then, use Privy's createViemAccount method to initialize an instance of a viem Account for an EVM server wallet. As a parameter to this method, pass an object with the following:

Field	Type	Description
walletId	string	ID of the wallet.
address	0x${string}	Ethereum address of the wallet.
privy	PrivyClient	Instance of the Privy client for your app.

As an example, you can initialize an Account like so:

import {PrivyClient} from '@privy-io/server-auth';
import {createViemAccount} from '@privy-io/server-auth/viem';

// Initialize your Privy client
const privy = new PrivyClient(...);
// Create a viem account instance for a wallet
const account = await createViemAccount({
  walletId: 'insert-wallet-id',
  address: 'insert-address',
  privy
});

From the returned Account, you can then initialize a viem WalletClient to sign messages and execute transactions with the wallet like so:

import {createWalletClient, http, parseEther} from 'viem';
import {base} from 'viem/chains';

const client = createWalletClient({
  account, // `Account` instance from above
  chain: base, // Replace with your desired network
  transport: http(),
});

const hash = await client.sendTransaction({
  to: '0x59D3eB21Dd06A211C89d1caBE252676e2F3F2218',
  value: parseEther('0.001'),
});