What is Near Protocol (NEAR)?

NEAR Protocol is a smart contract platform that has evolved from its original concept into a broader project. NEAR Protocol serves as a blockchain operating system for smart contracts and decentralized apps. The entire NEAR ecosystem also provides infrastructure for AI agents and cross-chain transactions.

What is NEAR Protocol (NEAR)?

NEAR Protocol is a Layer 1 smart contract platform that utilizes a Proof-of-Stake consensus. It functions as a blockchain operating system for smart contracts and decentralized apps. NEAR Protocol can be thought of as an iOS or Android operating system for the world of blockchains. Its fundamental idea is similar to Ethereum or Solana.

There are different name variations related to the NEAR project. It became known to crypto investors as NEAR Protocol, which refers to the Layer 1 smart contract platform itself. Both the ecosystem and project are now called NEAR, which is also the ticker symbol for its native token. The NEAR token is used for transaction fees, and NEAR Protocol validators are also staking it.

NEAR Protocol is a technologically advanced smart contract platform. It has a block time of just 0.6 seconds and has processed over 4,000 transactions per second at peak performance. A strength of the protocol is its sharding technology, which can scale dynamically as the transaction load increases. This enables significantly higher transaction capacity.

The NEAR ecosystem has grown beyond its original concept in recent years. NEAR Intents, which enables transactions across dozens of different blockchains, has gained considerable popularity. The project also aims to be part of the infrastructure for blockchain-based AI agents.

Key information about NEAR Protocol:

The native token of the NEAR Protocol is NEAR. You can view the real-time price of the NEAR token here: NEAR Protocol (NEAR) price.

This article is a beginner’s guide to the NEAR ecosystem. We will cover NEAR’s history, technology, and potential as an investment.

The history of NEAR

NEAR was founded by Alex Skidanov and Illia Polosukhin. Skidanov had previously worked at Microsoft and later on distributed databases at MemSQL, while Polosukhin worked as a machine learning researcher at Google. The duo met in San Francisco in connection with Skidanov’s earlier startup.

NEAR began as an AI-focused company called NEAR.AI. Its name references Ray Kurzweil’s book, The Singularity Is Near. Skidanov and Polosukhin foresaw the AI agent revolution, which has materialized in recent years, almost ten years ago. However, they were a bit too early given the state of the technology at the time.

While seeking a technical implementation for their AI project, Skidanov and Polosukhin turned to blockchain technology around 2017 and 2018. The founders quickly realized that existing solutions lacked the capacity to meet the demands of a payment infrastructure for AI agents. This led them to create their own smart contract platform: NEAR Protocol.

The founders raised $15 million for the project during the 2018–2019 bear market, even before the actual blockchain had been developed. NEAR raised a total of $36 million in funding during its initial years of operation.

The NEAR Protocol MainNet launched in a restricted mode in April 2020. This is how the project’s X account posted about the matter a couple of weeks later, after the NEAR blockchain had already processed one million blocks.

The first of many @ReadyLayerOne easter eggs has hatched. NEAR’s Genesis Block officially started the MainNet blockchain on April 22, 2020, ahead of schedule, & has 1 million blocks already produced! Congrats to the NEAR community on this major milestone. https://t.co/1nhU2R7exX

— NEAR Protocol (@NEARProtocol) May 4, 2020

NEAR’s public MainNet launched in October 2020. This is also when the NEAR token was launched. Trading began on cryptocurrency exchanges at a price of approximately $1.70.

NEAR gained widespread recognition during the 2020–2021 crypto bull market. Its token price rose above $20 in early 2022, marking over a twelvefold increase from its initial launch price. However, this was a relatively modest achievement, given that the top-performing smart contract platforms saw gains of 50 to 100 times during the 2020-2021 bull market.

In early 2022, NEAR secured $500 million in funding from some of the industry’s largest venture capital firms. What made this news remarkable was that NEAR obtained such significant funding during a market downturn. Funding rounds of this magnitude typically occur during bull markets.

The foundation for NEAR’s current popularity was laid in 2024 with the launches of the Chain Signatures and NEAR Intents protocols. NEAR Intents enables crypto transactions across different blockchains without the need for manual bridging. Users don’t need to worry about gas fees on the destination blockchain either.

Between 2025 and 2026, NEAR Intents expanded to support over 30 blockchains and was also upgraded with privacy features. NEAR Intents has been integrated into the NEAR.com platform.

NEAR has also returned more to its roots, as the project originally began as an AI startup. NEAR has built infrastructure making it possible for an AI agent to create a crypto account and transfer funds across blockchains through NEAR Intents. Additionally, NEAR AI Cloud allows users to run AI models privately and pay for the computation by staking NEAR tokens.

In September 2026, the first spot NEAR ETF was launched for the US market.

The NEAR Protocol Technology

Let’s take a look at the two key technical elements of the NEAR Protocol.

NEAR Protocol scales with sharding

NEAR Protocol has been developed to meet the demands of AI agents. Since AI agents are going to process vast numbers of micro-transactions, they need a blockchain that is both extremely fast and scalable. NEAR has built its blockchain using a sharding technology called Nightshade.

In practice, sharding means dividing the blockchain into smaller segments, allowing transactions to occur in parallel. This is called parallel processing.

Imagine a congested road with only one lane in each direction and no possibility of overtaking. What happens if the road is expanded to four lanes? Instead of a single car, four cars can travel side by side. Sharding operates on a similar principle.

At the time of writing, NEAR Protocol utilizes nine shards, which have processed a peak of slightly over 4,000 transactions per second. NEAR’s block time is just 0.6 seconds.

This capacity is not yet sufficient for the AI ​​agent revolution. NEAR’s solution to meeting the required capacity is dynamic sharding. In practice, this means that shards split into smaller segments automatically as network load increases. In theory, the system can enable up to a million transactions per second.

NEAR’s Proof of Stake Consensus

NEAR Protocol utilizes a Proof of Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism. Network security and block creation are handled by validators who stake NEAR tokens and receive staking rewards for their work. Ordinary NEAR investors can also delegate their NEAR tokens to a validator to earn a share of the staking rewards.

Blocks on the NEAR blockchain are created using the Doomslug protocol. Validators build new blocks in a predetermined order, while the remaining validators verify and approve them. The more tokens a specific validator stakes, the greater its influence over block approval.

NEAR Protocol has a block time of just 0.6 seconds. A block reaches finality once two new blocks have been built on top of it. This results in a Time to Finality (TTF) of approximately 1.2 seconds. Block approval requires more than two-thirds of the staked voting power.

The Doomslug protocol manages block production, while Nightshade distributes transaction processing across different shards.

NEAR.com and NEAR Intents

NEAR.com is an app designed for the transfer, management, and trading of cryptocurrencies. At its core lies the NEAR Intents protocol, a key driver behind NEAR’s growing popularity.

In practice, NEAR.com works like a non-custodial crypto wallet. Users can open an account without KYC. NEAR.com also offers features beyond crypto transfers; you can trade tokenized real-world assets (RWAs) and perpetual futures. You can also earn interest on your crypto holdings through Earn services.

Below is a screenshot of NEAR.com.

The standout feature of NEAR.com is cross-chain transfer, enabled by the NEAR Intents protocol. NEAR Intents was launched in beta in November 2024. More than 30 different blockchains have been integrated into the protocol throughout 2025 and 2026.

Thanks to NEAR Intents, end-users do not need to worry about token bridges or gas fees on the destination network. Underlying “solvers” execute the transfers automatically.

Example: You hold Zcash (ZEC) tokens but want to pay another party 100 USDT on the Tron network. For an average user, this operation would be quite cumbersome. With NEAR Intents, the process works essentially like this:

1. Select the currency to send (ZEC) and the network (Zcash)
2. Select the token the recipient will receive (USDT) and the network (Tron)
3. Enter the recipient’s Tron address and the desired amount of tokens (100 USDT)
4. NEAR.com indicates the amount of ZEC tokens to be sent
5. Execute the transaction

The recipient does not need to use NEAR.com, and all transaction fees are factored into the ZEC token amount. NEAR.com also features a “Confidential Account” (a private account), where balances and transactions are not publicly visible.

NEAR.com transactions are monitored using an AI-powered system called SHIELD. In September 2026, the process stopped Bitget exchange hackers from transferring over $50 million in funds through NEAR Intents.

NEAR is permissionless programmable money.

Permissionless means nobody needs permission to own and transfer assets, or deploy contracts on NEAR.

It does not mean every application or liquidity provider must process every transaction.

SHIELD is how NEAR Intents applies this in… https://t.co/QsIFdILVbe

— Illia (root.near) (🇺🇦, ⋈) (@ilblackdragon) September 28, 2026

By the end of 2025, the cumulative transaction volume of NEAR Intents was approximately $7 billion. By September 2026, that figure had surpassed $30 billion, with daily volume rising above $100 million.

NEAR and AI

NEAR began as an AI startup in 2017. Alex Skidanov and Illia Polosukhin aimed to develop AI models capable of generating code based on natural language. While the duo’s vision for AI development was spot-on, they were slightly ahead of their time.

In recent years, NEAR has returned to its roots in a sense by building infrastructure for AI developers. NEAR AI Cloud provides an environment for running AI models and developing applications. Its key feature is privacy: AI models operate in a secure environment to which not even NEAR has access. Such an environment is particularly appealing to companies whose AI applications handle critical customer data or trade secrets.

IronClaw, announced in February 2026, is an open-source environment for running AI agents. NEAR Intents completes the ecosystem by offering infrastructure for AI agent payments. AI agents can execute cross-chain transactions just like human users using the NEAR Intents protocol.

Since the summer of 2026, NEAR AI usage could be paid for in two ways: via a standard invoice or by staking NEAR tokens. Staking NEAR generates credits that can be used to pay for the use of AI agents and AI models. The more you stake, the more credits you receive.

Over time, this payment method could generate additional demand for NEAR tokens if the popularity of NEAR AI grows.

The NEAR Token

The native token (cryptocurrency) of the NEAR ecosystem is also named NEAR. This is also the ticker symbol. It is primarily used for paying transaction fees and for staking by validators.

The NEAR token was launched in October 2020. At that time, one billion NEAR tokens were created and distributed according to the allocation shown in the image.

Since its launch, the supply of NEAR tokens has grown from 1.0 billion to approximately 1.3 billion. This increase is due to the NEAR Protocol’s inflation rate, which was initially capped at 5%. It has been capped at 2.5% from 2025 onward.

The primary use case for the NEAR token is paying transaction fees on the NEAR blockchain. These fees typically amount to fractions of a cent. Additionally, the NEAR token is used for staking to secure the network. Validators stake NEAR and receive staking rewards for maintaining the blockchain. These rewards are the primary source of NEAR’s inflation.

NEAR Intents and AI services have expanded the use cases for the NEAR token in recent years. NEAR Intents enables the transfer of cryptocurrencies between blockchains, and the protocol collects transaction fees for this service. These fees are used to purchase NEAR tokens from the market.

The NEAR AI Cloud allows for running AI models and creating IronClaw AI agents. Payment for these services can be made, in part, by staking NEAR tokens.

To counterbalance inflation, NEAR also burns a part of the transaction fees. Smart contracts return 30 percent of transaction fees to the application developer, while the remaining 70 percent are burned. If transaction volume is high, the number of burned tokens can exceed the rate of inflation, potentially making NEAR a deflationary currency (at least temporarily).

NEAR as an investment

Historically, NEAR has not been a great investment. Its NEAR token was launched in October 2020 as the crypto market entered its biggest bull run in history. However, NEAR never managed to capture the hype many other Layer 1 smart contract platforms had at the time. DeFi (or its absence) was probably the primary cause.

From 2020 to 2025, smart contract platforms with active DeFi economies have performed well. Below is a list of the largest smart contract platforms based on DeFi liquidity (TVL).

At the time of publishing this article, NEAR ranks 20th, and its DeFi liquidity has never exceeded $500 million.

Investor interest in NEAR has surged again in 2026. This is not driven by growth in NEAR’s DeFi sector but by other factors—most notably NEAR.com and the NEAR Intents protocol. NEAR has created a genuinely useful service, with transaction volumes multiplying throughout 2026.

Additionally, its status as an AI project has undoubtedly attracted new investors. While it’s hard to assess NEAR’s popularity in the AI crypto industry, AI applications probably haven’t yet significantly impacted the price of the NEAR token.

Crypto investors are looking for projects that can produce real revenue and also deliver some of that to token holders. In the future, news of partnerships or founders’ visions of future growth will no longer be enough to drive the price higher.

Investors want to see the protocol generate earnings and use those funds for investors’ benefit, such as by buying tokens on the market. NEAR has the potential to succeed in this environment.

You can invest in NEAR safely and securely at ByBit.