# Solana words explained: rent, lamports, token accounts and more > The words Solana wallets use, each in a sentence or two, with the numbers as they are in October 2026 and links to the longer answers. Page: https://ravenwallet.pro/blog/solana-glossary Updated: 2026-10-27 ## Wallets and keys ### Wallet A key pair: a public address that anyone can send to, and a private key that signs. On chain, a wallet is a system account that holds SOL. ### Address The public half of a key pair, 32 to 44 letters and numbers, for example the one you paste to receive SOL. Safe to share. ### Private key The secret half of a key pair. Whoever has it controls the wallet. Usually shown as about 88 characters. See [seed phrase vs private key](/blog/seed-phrase-vs-private-key). ### Recovery phrase (seed phrase) Twelve or 24 words from which a wallet app makes as many key pairs as you need. The master backup for every wallet made from it. ### Derivation path The numbers that pick one wallet out of a recovery phrase, such as m/44'/501'/0'/0' for Phantom's first account. Different apps use different paths. See [Solana derivation paths](/blog/solana-derivation-paths). ## Accounts and rent ### Account Everything on Solana lives in accounts: wallets, coins you hold, programs and their data. Each account has an address, an owner program, some data and a SOL balance. ### Lamport The smallest unit of SOL. 1 SOL is 1,000,000,000 lamports. ### Rent The SOL an account must hold to exist: (128 + its data size in bytes) × 5,080 lamports today. A deposit, not a fee, returned in full when the account closes. See [Solana rent explained](/blog/solana-rent-explained). ### Rent exempt An account holding at least its minimum. Every account must be rent exempt; nothing is taken from it over time. ### Token account The account that holds one coin for one wallet. Each coin you hold has its own, holding 0.00149 SOL of rent (0.00204 SOL for older ones). ### Associated token account The standard token account for a wallet and a coin, at an address anyone can work out from the two. Apps send coins there by default. ### Closing an account Ending an empty account and sending its rent to a wallet you choose. See [how to get SOL back from empty token accounts](/blog/reclaim-solana-rent). ## Transactions and fees ### Transaction A signed bundle of instructions that runs all at once or not at all. At most 1,232 bytes. ### Signature Proof that a key pair approved a transaction. Also the transaction's ID: the string you look up on an explorer. ### Base fee 5,000 lamports (0.000005 SOL) per signature on every transaction. ### Priority fee An optional extra, priced per compute unit, that helps a transaction land faster when the network is busy. See [Solana fees explained](/blog/solana-network-fees). ### Compute units A measure of how much work a transaction asks validators to do. ### Fee payer The wallet that pays a transaction's fees. Usually the sender, but any signing wallet can pay for the others. ### Blockhash A recent block's ID that every transaction includes. A transaction whose blockhash is more than about a minute old is refused. ### Slippage How far a swap's price may move between the quote and the moment it lands before the swap is cancelled. ## Coins ### Mint The account that defines a coin: its supply, its decimals and who may create more. A coin's address is its mint address. ### SPL Token and Token-2022 The two token programs on Solana. Token-2022 adds extensions such as transfer fees, transfer hooks and confidential transfers. ### Wrapped SOL SOL held in a token account so programs can treat it like any other coin. Closing the account turns it back into SOL. ### Burn Destroying coins you hold. Burning everything in a token account lets you close it and take back its rent. ### Dust Small leftover balances of coins, often worth less than the fee to sell them. ## Staking ### Validator A computer that runs Solana and earns rewards for it. You can delegate SOL to one. ### Epoch Solana's reward period, 432,000 slots, about two days. ### Stake account An account you own that holds SOL delegated to a validator. At least 1 SOL as of October 2026. ### Liquid staking token A token such as jupSOL that stands for staked SOL and grows in value with the rewards, while you can still sell it. See [jupSOL or your own stake account](/blog/stake-sol-jupsol). ## Sources - [Solana docs: Accounts](https://solana.com/docs/core/accounts) - [Solana docs: Transactions](https://solana.com/docs/core/transactions) - [Solana docs: Fees](https://solana.com/docs/core/fees) - [Solana docs: Tokens](https://solana.com/docs/tokens) - [Solana: Reduced rent, SIMD-0437](https://solana.com/upgrades/reduced-rent)