> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://soroban-cost-estimator.gitbook.io/soroban-cost_estimator-docs/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://soroban-cost-estimator.gitbook.io/soroban-cost_estimator-docs/introduction.md).

# Introduction

`soroban-cost-estimator` is a CLI tool that wraps Stellar's `simulateTransaction` RPC to report the real resource consumption of your compiled Soroban contract `.wasm` files — CPU instructions, memory, read/write ledger entries and bytes, transaction size, and the resulting fee in stroops and XLM. It works from compiled artifacts: no test harness, no local container, no instrumentation of your test code. It simulates the invocation against a live RPC endpoint (testnet, mainnet, or futurenet) and prints a cost report, or a machine-readable JSON document for CI pipelines.

Every other Soroban cost tool tells you what your contract costs today; this one tells you when your cost report is lying to you because the network changed its prices. It snapshots the network's resource-pricing configuration (the `ConfigSettingContract*` ledger entries) as a versioned artifact, diffs it against previous snapshots, and cross-references its own cache of past estimates to tell you exactly which ones are now stale after a pricing change. That makes it a maintenance and monitoring tool, not just a one-shot calculator.

## How this tool relates to other Soroban cost tools

The [Stellar Resource Usage Report](https://github.com/57blocks/stellar-resource-usage-report) is a real-time profiler: it instruments your JavaScript/TypeScript test code and prints resource tables (CPU instructions, memory, ledger entry sizes) from transactions executed against a local `stellar/quickstart` container. It answers *"what did my contract consume while I ran it just now?"*

This tool solves a different problem by a different mechanism. It needs no test harness and no local container — it works from your compiled artifacts and gets real numbers from live `simulateTransaction` RPC simulation against testnet/mainnet. And it does something no other Soroban cost tool does: it tracks the network's resource-pricing configuration as a first-class, versioned artifact.

> ⚠️ **Disclaimer:** This is unaudited developer tooling. Always verify fee estimates against your target network before mainnet deploy.

## Project layout

| Directory | Purpose                                                                                                                                               |
| --------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `src/`    | CLI (`cli.rs`), WASM parsing (`wasm/`), RPC client (`rpc/`), fee math (`report/`), config snapshots (`config_snapshot/`), estimate cache (`cache.rs`) |
| `tests/`  | Integration tests plus the fixture contract and its cross-check record (`fixtures/contract/README.md`)                                                |

The full source is on GitHub: <https://github.com/aigbagbobila/soroban-cost-estimator>


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