A layer 1 Blockchain

NEAR is a Layer 1 blockchain, meaning it is not dependent on other chains. It uses a unique scaling mechanism (Nightshade sharding) and makes it especially easy to onboard new users (e.g. through named accounts). It opens the door to mass adoption for Web3.

A building platform

The NEAR protocol serves as the secure, scalable foundation for a new kind of decentralized application (dApps). It is also built to be especially easy for developers to use (e.g. by coding in JavaScript). Hundreds of projects are already building exciting dApps on NEAR.

Developers are the lifeblood of the blockchain ecosystem. For blockchain technology to gain mainstream adoption, it needs to lower the barriers for entry for developers and allow them to create fun and sophisticated apps for the regular folks to enjoy. It is for this very reason that NEAR’s smart contracts are written using AssemblyScript due to its similarity to JavaScript.

Applications on NEAR have two distinct parts – a back-end and front-end.

• Smart Contract (back-end): Storing and modifying data on the chain. Contracts need to expose methods that allow clients to “view” and “change” state.
• Interactions with Smart Contract (front-end): You can interact with your contracts or contracts deployed by other people. You do this by using near-api-js Quickstart and Code Snippets in your application.

NEAR currently supports:

• Rust – near-sdk-rs: A wrapper that provides improved safety for the Rust programming language for high-value contracts.
• AssemblyScript near-sdk-as: A collection of helpers that make your SmartContracts look similar to TypeScript while compiling to Wasm for execution.

NOTE: AssemblyScript is currently not recommended for production financial applications due to the newness of the language and compilation tools available.