What is NEAR Protocol?

Jacob HoekertJacob Hoekert
Aug 9, 2023|2 min read

An Insight into NEAR Protocol

For those looking to enter the decentralized application space, NEAR Protocol offers a unique platform worth considering. This novel blockchain architecture provides an interesting alternative to other existing chains.

What Makes NEAR Unique?

A Glimpse of Sharding

At the heart of NEAR lies sharding. Rather than loading the entire blockchain, sharding breaks down the network's structure, distributing it across participants. This not only streamlines data retrieval but also fosters platform scalability.

From AWS to NEAR

If you're familiar with Amazon Web Services (AWS), you'll recognize how NEAR functions. However, while AWS centralizes operations, NEAR thrives on a decentralized computer network. It integrates the convenience of AWS-like services with the security of blockchain, courtesy of its native NEAR token.

Brains Behind NEAR

The ingenious minds of Alex Skidanov and Illia Polosukhin conceptualized NEAR Protocol. With Alex's expertise from MemSQL and Illia's contributions to Google, the duo raised over $500 million from elite investors.

NEAR’s Technological Edge

Nightshade: Sharding Perfected

NEAR's 'Nightshade' takes sharding a step further. It allows a uniform data chain while partitioning computational needs into manageable "chunks." Thus, providing an architecture that's both scalable and secure.

Rainbow Bridge & Aurora

While Rainbow Bridge allows user to easily transer Ethereum tokens to NEAR, Aurora offers Ethereum app developers a platform to expand onto NEAR's network, combining NEAR's efficiency with Ethereum's EVM ecosystem network effects.

Value Proposition of NEAR

NEAR's token serves as the backbone for transactions, application operations, and storage. Token burning mechanisms and validator rewards further stabilize and secure the system. Plus, with an annual 5% increase in token supply, validators get a major share, while the rest supports continuous platform enhancement.

Why Opt for NEAR?

For tech enthusiasts, NEAR’s sharding might be the next big thing. Developers can leverage NEAR for scalable applications, and Ethereum developers can seamlessly transition with Layer 2 solutions.

Building NFT Applications on NEAR with Indexer.xyz

For those passionate about NFTs, NEAR offers an exciting avenue. By leveraging Indexer.xyz, the premier NFT indexer on NEAR Protocol, developers can easily get up and running with any sort of NFT application or feature without having to build complex indexing architecture. NEAR's sharding feature presents a big challenge for developers as they index the chain, so Indexer.xyz helps remove that barrier, helping NFT marketplaces, NFT collections, wallets, analytics sites, and more go-to-market much more quickly.