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RPC errors · eth_sendRawTransaction

typed transaction too short / failed to decode signed transaction

What it means

The node could not decode the bytes you sent as a signed transaction, so it never got as far as checking the signature, nonce or balance. Typed (EIP-2718) transactions start with a type byte (0x01, 0x02, 0x03, 0x04) followed by an RLP payload; "too short" means the payload after the type byte is missing or truncated.

OP Stack chains phrase the same failure as "failed to decode signed transaction"; other clients say "short input" or "decode transaction failed". The cause is the same: what arrived is not a complete serialized, signed transaction.

The exact messages, and where we saw them

Returned by real upstream nodes when we triggered this error on 2026-09-24 through our endpoint on each chain we serve.

typed transaction too short
Code -32000. Seen on 28 chains: 0G, Arbitrum, Arbitrum Nova, Avalanche, Beam, Blast, BNB Smart Chain, Chiliz, Core, Cronos, Ethereum Classic, Flare, HAQQ, Kava, Linea, Mantle, opBNB, Polygon, PulseChain, Robinhood Chain, Scroll, Sei, Shibarium, Sonic, Story, Syscoin, Taiko, WEMIX.
failed to decode signed transaction
Code -32602. Seen on 11 chains: Berachain, Fraxtal, Hyperliquid, Ink, Optimism, Plasma, Soneium, Telos EVM, Tempo, Unichain, Zora.
typed transaction too short
Code -32602. Seen on 2 chains: Boba Network, Celo.
decode transaction failed
Code -32603. Seen on 2 chains: Astar, peaq.
short input: 1
Code -32000. Seen on 2 chains: Ethereum, Polygon zkEVM.
reading transaction object failed - rawTx: 0x00, error: error unmarshalling
Code -32600. Seen on 2 chains: Arc, Base.

How to fix it

  • Send the output of your library's serialize/sign step, hex-encoded with a 0x prefix: signTransaction in viem/ethers, raw_transaction from web3.py's sign_transaction.
  • Check for accidental truncation (logging or string-slicing the raw hex), double 0x prefixes, or sending the transaction hash instead of the raw transaction.
  • If you build transactions by hand, confirm the type byte matches the fields you serialized (an EIP-1559 0x02 payload with legacy fields will not decode).

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