Paymasters (Sponsored Transactions)

One of the biggest UX enhancements unlocked by Smart Wallet is the ability for app developers to sponsor their users' transactions. If your app supports Smart Wallet, you can start sponsoring your users' transactions by using standardized Paymaster service communication enabled by new wallet RPC methods.

This guide is specific to using Smart Wallet, you can find our more about using Paymasters with Base in the Base Go Gasless page.

The code below is also in our Wagmi Smart Wallet template.

Skip ahead and clone the template

If you are looking for a complete example, you can skip the steps below and clone the Wagmi Smart Wallet template. Simply open a terminal and run:

git clone https://github.com/wilsoncusack/wagmi-scw.git

Follow the instructions in the README to install the dependencies and run the app.

Add Support in your Next.js app (using Wagmi/Viem)

Set up your Paymaster service

As a prerequisite, you'll need to obtain a Paymaster service URL from a Paymaster service provider.

We'll use Coinbase Developer Platform as a Paymaster service provider, currently offering up to $15k in gas credits as part of the Base Gasless Campaign.

Once you have signed up for Coinbase Developer Platform, you get your Paymaster service URL by navigating to Onchain Tools > Paymaster as shown below:

How to get your Paymaster service URL

Once you have your Paymaster service URL, you can proceed to setting up your contracts allowlist. This is a list of contracts and function calls that you want to be sponsored by the Paymaster.

How to set your Paymaster contracts allowlist

Congrats! You've set up your Paymaster service and contracts allowlist. It's time to create Wagmi and Viem clients.

Create Wagmi and Viem clients

This section shows you how to create Wagmi and Viem clients to interact with Smart Wallet using the Paymaster service you set up in the previous steps.

wagmi.ts

import { http, createConfig } from "wagmi";
import { baseSepolia } from "wagmi/chains";
import { coinbaseWallet } from "wagmi/connectors";
 
export const cbWalletConnector = coinbaseWallet({
  appName: "Wagmi Smart Wallet",
  preference: "smartWalletOnly",
});
 
export const config = createConfig({
  chains: [baseSepolia],
  // turn off injected provider discovery
  multiInjectedProviderDiscovery: false,
  connectors: [cbWalletConnector],
  ssr: true,
  transports: {
    [baseSepolia.id]: http(),
  },
});

Send EIP-5792 requests with a Paymaster service capability

Once you have your Paymaster service set up, you can now pass its URL along to Wagmi's useWriteContracts hook.

page.tsx

import { useAccount } from "wagmi";
import { useCapabilities, useWriteContracts } from "wagmi/experimental";
import { useMemo, useState } from "react";
import { CallStatus } from "./CallStatus";
import { myNFTABI, myNFTAddress } from "./myNFT";
 
export function App() {
  const account = useAccount();
  const [id, setId] = useState<string | undefined>(undefined);
  const { writeContracts } = useWriteContracts({
    mutation: { onSuccess: (id) => setId(id) },
  });
  const { data: availableCapabilities } = useCapabilities({
    account: account.address,
  });
  const capabilities = useMemo(() => {
    if (!availableCapabilities || !account.chainId) return {};
    const capabilitiesForChain = availableCapabilities[account.chainId];
    if (
      capabilitiesForChain["PaymasterService"] &&
      capabilitiesForChain["PaymasterService"].supported
    ) {
      return {
        const PaymasterServiceUrl = process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_PAYMASTER_PROXY_SERVER_URL
        PaymasterService: {
          url: PaymasterServiceUrl // You can also use the minimalist proxy we created: `${document.location.origin}/api/Paymaster`
        },
      };
    }
    return {};
  }, [availableCapabilities, account.chainId]);
 
  return (
    <div>
      <h2>Transact With Paymaster</h2>
      <p>{JSON.stringify(capabilities)}</p>
      <div>
        <button
          onClick={() => {
            writeContracts({
              contracts: [
                {
                  address: myNFTAddress,
                  abi: myNFTABI,
                  functionName: "safeMint",
                  args: [account.address],
                },
              ],
              capabilities,
            });
          }}
        >
          Mint
        </button>
        {id && <CallStatus id={id} />}
      </div>
    </div>
  );
}

That's it! Smart Wallet will handle the rest. If your Paymaster service is able to sponsor the transaction, in the UI Smart Wallet will indicate to your user that the transaction is sponsored.