The getTokenAccountBalance RPC method returns the token balance of a specific SPL Token account. This is essential for applications that need to display or verify the amount of a particular token held by a token account.

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Common Use Cases

  • Displaying User Token Balances: Showing users how much of a specific token they own in their wallet (associated token accounts).
  • Verifying Token Availability: Checking if a token account has sufficient balance before attempting a transfer or other operation.
  • Portfolio Tracking: Aggregating token balances for a user across different token accounts.
  • Smart Contract Interactions: Smart contracts might query token balances as part of their logic (though on-chain programs typically access this data directly from account info).

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Request Parameters

  1. Token Account Public Key (string, required): The base-58 encoded public key of the SPL Token account you want to query.
  2. Configuration Object (object, optional): An optional object that can contain the following field:
    • commitment (string, optional): Specifies the commitment level for the query. If omitted, the default commitment of the RPC node is used (usually finalized).

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Response Structure

The result field in the JSON-RPC response contains an object with a context and a value field. The value object holds the balance information:
  • amount (string): The raw balance of the token account as a string. This is an integer representing the smallest unit of the token (e.g., if a token has 6 decimals, an amount of “1000000” means 1 token).
  • decimals (u8): The number of decimal places defined for this token type (by its mint).
  • uiAmount (number | null): The balance formatted as a floating-point number, taking into account the decimals. This field might be null or deprecated in some contexts in favor of uiAmountString.
  • uiAmountString (string): The balance formatted as a string, taking into account the decimals. This is often preferred for display to avoid potential floating-point inaccuracies.
Example Response: 
{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "result": {
    "context": {
      "slot": 183457201
    },
    "value": {
      "amount": "500000000",
      "decimals": 9,
      "uiAmount": 0.5,
      "uiAmountString": "0.5"
    }
  },
  "id": 1
}

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Code Examples

# Basic Request (replace <TOKEN_ACCOUNT_PUBKEY>):
curl -X POST -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d \
  '{
    "jsonrpc": "2.0",
    "id": 1,
    "method": "getTokenAccountBalance",
    "params": [
      "<TOKEN_ACCOUNT_PUBKEY>"
    ]
  }' \
  <YOUR_RPC_URL>

# Request with commitment (replace <TOKEN_ACCOUNT_PUBKEY>):
curl -X POST -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d \
  '{
    "jsonrpc": "2.0",
    "id": 1,
    "method": "getTokenAccountBalance",
    "params": [
      "<TOKEN_ACCOUNT_PUBKEY>",
      {
        "commitment": "confirmed"
      }
    ]
  }' \
  <YOUR_RPC_URL>

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Developer Tips

  • Token Account vs. Mint Account vs. Owner Account: Ensure you are providing the public key of the SPL Token Account, not the token’s mint address or the owner’s wallet address. You typically get token accounts for an owner using getTokenAccountsByOwner.
  • Decimals: Always use the decimals field to correctly interpret the amount. The uiAmountString is generally safer for display than uiAmount to avoid floating-point precision issues.
  • Non-Existent Accounts: If the provided public key does not correspond to an existing token account, the behavior might vary slightly by RPC provider or library, but often the value in the response will be null or an error will be thrown. The JavaScript example includes a basic check for balance.value.
  • Commitment Levels: Using different commitment levels can affect how quickly you see balance changes, especially for very recent transactions. finalized is the safest but has the most latency.
This guide should help you accurately retrieve and interpret SPL token balances using the getTokenAccountBalance method.