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Metamask: ethers web3provider can’t connect to metamask the second time

Published by Terlumun Aondover on February 13th, 2025.

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Metamask Connectivity Issue: Unable to Connect to Web3Provider for the Second Time

As a developer building a React NFT marketplace on Polygon, you’ve probably experienced the frustration of encountering connectivity issues with your web3 provider. In this article, we’ll dive into the details of why Metamask/web3provider fails to connect for the second time and provide guidance on how to resolve this issue.

The Issue:

Metamask: ethers web3provider can't connect to metamask the second time

When a user creates an NFT on our platform, they are prompted to connect their Metamask wallet to interact with it. However, after successfully connecting the first time, the web3 provider fails to reconnect for the second time, resulting in connectivity issues when attempting to create, buy, or relist an NFT.

Why is this happening?

Several factors contribute to this issue:

Web3 provider reconnection mechanism

: Web3 providers like MetaMask and others have a built-in reconnection mechanism that attempts to reconnect to the wallet after it has been closed. This process can be intermittent, causing issues when the connection has already been established.

Wallet session timeout: When a user closes the wallet, the session timeout can prevent the Web3 provider from automatically reconnecting. This timeout is usually set to 60 seconds by default, but can vary depending on the wallet and operating system.

Network outages: Network outages or DNS resolution issues between the wallet and our platform can cause connectivity issues.

Solutions:

To address this issue, we recommend implementing the following solutions:

Implement a reconnection mechanism: Introduce an API endpoint that listens for reconnection requests from the Web3 provider. When a user closes their wallet, send a request to this endpoint to initiate the reconnection.

Use a Web3Provider with advanced options: Use a web3 provider like MetaMask’s wallet-adapter or ethers.js, which provides more control over the reconnection process and allows for better optimization.

Implement a session timeout: Set a session timeout for the wallet to prevent it from closing unnecessarily, ensuring that reconnection attempts can occur without interruption.

Sample code:

Here is an example of how you might implement a reconnection mechanism using MetaMask’s wallet-adapter and ethers.js:


import { WalletAdapter } from "@metamask/web3-provider";
import { ethers } from "ethers";
const walletAdapter = new WalletAdapter();
export default async function connectWallet() {
try {
const provider = await walletAdapter.connect();
// Use the connected provider for subsequent operations
} catch (error) {
console.error("Error connecting to wallet:", error);
// Introduce a reconnection attempt after a short delay
setTimeout(connectWallet, 5000).catch(() => null);
}
}

In this example, we use connect to establish a connection with the Metamask provider and store it in the provider variable. Then, we try to reconnect using connect again after a delay of 5 seconds. If an error occurs during reconnection, we log the error and introduce another reconnection attempt.

By implementing these solutions or modifying your existing code, you should be able to resolve the connectivity issue with Metamask/web3provider for the second time when creating, purchasing, or re-listing an NFT on our React NFT marketplace.