NEAR Protocol (NEAR) is an open-source Layer 1 blockchain platform designed to provide a high-performance, low-cost, and user-friendly environment for developing and running decentralized applications (dApps). Through its innovative technical architecture, it aims to solve the “trilemma” of scalability, usability, and decentralization faced by existing blockchains.
The Origins and Vision of NEAR Protocol
NEAR Protocol was founded in 2018 by Illia Polosukhin and Alexander Skidanov. Polosukhin was a machine learning researcher at Google Research and co-authored the groundbreaking 2017 paper “Attention Is All You Need,” which introduced the Transformer architecture—now the foundation of modern AI systems.Skidanov, meanwhile, built distributed databases at MemSQL (now SingleStore) and possesses deep expertise in distributed systems and scalability.
While exploring issues related to scaling AI models and cross-border payments, the two founders discovered that blockchain technology faced challenges in scalability, availability, and decentralization—areas that aligned closely with their professional backgrounds. Consequently, they decided to build a blockchain network that both developers and users would enjoy using.
The NEAR Protocol mainnet officially launched on April 22, 2020, and began community-led operations in September of the same year.
NEAR’s vision is to build an “open network platform” that accelerates the development and deployment of decentralized applications. Positioned as a blockchain “built for AI,” it aims to support applications, agents, and users worldwide to drive the growth of an AI-driven economy.
Core Technical Features
NEAR Protocol enhances its performance and user experience through a series of innovative technologies:
- Sharding Technology (Nightshade): This is NEAR’s core mechanism for addressing scalability challenges. Nightshade divides the network into multiple segments (called “shards”), allowing validators to process transactions and smart contracts in parallel, rather than processing all transactions across the entire network.This means that as network demand grows, NEAR’s capacity can scale accordingly, enabling cost-effective and fast transactions. As of 2025, NEAR has eight active shards in operation, with transaction finality times of approximately 600 milliseconds.
- Threshold Proof-of-Stake (TPoS) Consensus Mechanism: NEAR uses TPoS to select validators who secure the network. Validators participate in network security by staking NEAR tokens, and any malicious behavior may result in the forfeiture of their staked tokens.TPoS uses an auction system to select validators, aiming to enhance the decentralization and fairness of reward distribution, reduce forks, and ensure faster transaction completion.
- Aurora Virtual Machine (Aurora EVM): Aurora is a Ethereum virtual machine (EVM) customized by the NEAR Protocol team, allowing developers to run Ethereum-compatible dApps on the NEAR network without having to rewrite code or learn new development tools.This enables NEAR users to interact with applications built on Ethereum while enjoying faster transaction speeds and lower transaction costs.
- Rainbow Bridge: The Rainbow Bridge facilitates interoperability between NEAR and Ethereum, allowing users to easily transfer any Ethereum tokens and data between the two blockchains.
- Human-Readable Account Names: To enhance the user experience, NEAR allows users to use easily recognizable account names (such as “alice.near”) instead of lengthy cryptographic addresses.
- Miner Fee Rebates and Gas Fee Delegation: Developers can pay transaction fees themselves or, through the gas fee delegation system, have applications pay transaction fees on behalf of users, thereby improving the user experience and lowering the barrier to entry.
- Chain Abstraction and NEAR Intents: NEAR is committed to simplifying the complexity of blockchain. Through chain abstraction, users and AI agents can interact with multiple blockchains (such as Ethereum, Bitcoin, Solana, etc.) using a single NEAR account, without needing to switch wallets, manage gas tokens, or understand the underlying networks. NEAR Intents, on the other hand, allow users to express the outcomes they wish to achieve (such as “exchange my SOL for ETH”) without having to manually execute specific steps; off-chain solvers then fulfill these intents in the most efficient manner.
- Chain Signatures: This feature allows NEAR accounts to sign transactions on different blockchains, enabling true cross-chain interoperability and allowing a single NEAR account to control and manage multi-chain assets, accounts, and data.
Uses of the NEAR Token (NEAR)
NEAR is the native token of the NEAR Protocol and serves several core purposes:
- Paying Transaction and Storage Fees: Users must use NEAR tokens to pay the fees required for conducting transactions and storing data on the NEAR Protocol.
- Staking and Network Security: NEAR holders can stake their tokens to help secure the network and earn rewards.
- Participation in Protocol Governance: NEAR tokens grant holders the right to participate in the protocol’s decision-making process, ensuring more democratic and inclusive project management.
Ecosystem and Applications
The NEAR Protocol ecosystem is rapidly expanding, spanning multiple sectors including decentralized finance (DeFi), non-fungible tokens (NFTs), gaming, payments, and AI. The platform supports developers in building high-performance dApps and provides a wealth of tools, documentation, and community resources.
NEAR is also actively pursuing the integration of AI and blockchain, for example, by establishing a dedicated AI fund to attract AI engineers to jointly develop NEAR ML, a Web3 machine learning protocol that enables smart contracts to directly invoke GPT-4-level models. NEAR’s open infrastructure combines cross-chain execution, confidential settlement, private inference, and a secure proxy framework, aiming to serve as the foundation for a secure proxy economy.
Notable projects in the ecosystem include DeFi applications such as Ref Finance and Burrow.
Summary
As a Layer 1 blockchain, NEAR Protocol aims to provide a scalable, efficient, and accessible platform for decentralized applications through its innovative sharding technology, developer-friendly tools, and focus on user experience.With its continued investment in AI and advancements in cutting-edge technologies such as chain abstraction, NEAR is working to build an open internet capable of supporting the AI-driven future.
