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NEAR is a user-friendly blockchain, built to be fast, secure, and infinitely scalable. It offers a simple user experience with named accounts, low fees, and a robust developer ecosystem. img In technical terms, NEAR is a layer one, sharded, proof-of-stake blockchain built with usability in mind. In simpler terms, NEAR is the blockchain for everyone.
Layer-1 means NEAR is the foundation that supports everything else built on it. It keeps all the transaction records safe and unchangeable which keeps the network secure and trustworthy.Sharded means the network is broken into pieces that work in parallel. This helps NEAR process transactions quickly and efficiently.Proof-of-stake uses less electricity compared with other blockchains which use proof-of-work. Users show they own NEAR tokens to help run the network. This makes it cheaper and lets more people use it.

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Why Choose NEAR?

NEAR offers built-in features such as named accounts and account abstraction. For developers, NEAR offers everything needed for their applications, from smart contracts to indexers. All while being interoperable with other chains.

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Simple to Use

  1. Use named accounts like alice.near
  2. Simple sign-up: create an account for free, login with socials (through NEAR Auth or Privy) or telegram
  3. Transactions are fast (~1.2s finality, with blocks every 600ms) and cheap (< 1¢ in fees)
  4. Users don’t need to buy crypto: apps can pay their gas fees through meta transactions
  5. Access Keys make it safe and easy to use
  6. Control accounts on other chains thanks to chain signatures

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Battle-Tested

  1. 100% uptime since its 2020 launch and over 5.4 Billion transactions processed
  2. NEAR has sustained peaks of >13M transactions in a single day
  3. NEAR is home to decentralized apps with millions of users:

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Great Developer Experience

  1. Build smart contracts in Rust with the official NEAR SDK
  2. Simple onboarding, thanks to its complete documentation and examples
  3. Earn from your contract’s gas fees
  4. EVM compatible with Project Aurora (Deploy your Solidity contracts with ease)

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Environmentally Friendly

  1. In 2021, NEAR was certified carbon-neutral
  2. NEAR consumes in a year the same energy bitcoin consumes in a few minutes

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Start Building

Ready to build on NEAR? Check Start Building to choose what you want to build, and find the guides and tools you need for it.