For Stakers

Delegators (stakers) can override their validator’s governance vote using their individual stake account. This is a core feature of svmgov: delegator sovereignty.

What Is a Vote Override?

By default, a validator votes on behalf of all stake delegated to them, weighted by total active stake. If you disagree with your validator’s vote, you can submit your own vote for your specific stake account. Your stake’s weight is then removed from the validator’s tally and applied according to your preference.

How It Works

Validator has 1,000 SOL stake
  ├── 800 SOL from Delegator A  ← Delegator A overrides with their own vote
  └── 200 SOL from Delegator B  ← No override, follows validator's vote

Effect:
  Validator's effective vote: 200 SOL (their own 200 SOL remains)
  Delegator A's vote: 800 SOL (their own allocation)

The Merkle proof system ensures that:

1. You can only override the vote for stake you own
2. The stake account must be in the NCN snapshot (active at snapshot slot)
3. Double overrides for the same stake account are prevented by a VoteOverride PDA

Two Override Paths

Path A — Validator has already voted: Your override immediately adjusts the validator’s on-chain vote tallies.

Path B — Validator hasn’t voted yet: Your preferences are stored in a VoteOverrideCache. When the validator eventually calls cast_vote, your cached override is applied automatically.

Requirements

• A stake account with active delegation to a validator
• The staker keypair (withdraw authority or signing key for the stake account)
• The validator’s vote account address
• Access to operator API for Merkle proofs. The CLI defaults to the main NCN router: https://ncn-governance.solana.com.

Quick Setup

# Install svmgov
cd svmgov/cli && ./install.sh
 
# Run interactive setup
svmgov init
# > Select: Staker
 
# Optional: override the default operator API URL
svmgov config set operator-api-url https://your-operator-api.example.com

Commands

Global Arguments