Introduction

To unlock real growth, consumer apps must deliver web2-like simplicity: one unified balance, fast, frictionless transactions, and zero visible complexity.

Nobody wants to juggle multiple accounts, gas fees, bridges, or scattered assets. The current onchain experience is clunky, slow, and confusing which holds back adoption.

Users don’t care how many chains or what infra is involved, they just want it to work. Period. They want effortless access to their app with any asset—SOL, USDC, BTC, POL, or USDT—without the mess of fragmented wallets, chains, or complex processes.

The future belongs to apps that make web3 feel like magic which is why we’re thrilled to introduce the Chain Abstraction Framework with NEAR. The goal of the framework is simple: to streamline building Consumer Apps that truly abstract onchain complexities.

The Chain Abstraction Framework: NEAR Chain Signatures 🤝 Socket Chain Abstraction Protocol

The goal of the chain abstraction framework is to tackle asset fragmentation that persists in the space today. Users today are forced to deal with different wallets & accounts with fragmented assets across these accounts. This means users are forced to manage USDC on different chains separately with different wallets, often goin through bridging & other cross-chain infrastructure.

The chain abstraction framework combines the power of NEAR chain signatures and Socket chain abstraction protocol to end asset fragmentation. The Chain Abstraction Framework at its core unlocks a single account & a single balance for the user:

• A single account that can control accounts across every chain remotely with the power of NEAR chain signatures

• A chain abstracted balance i.e an aggregated balance across chains that users can transact with on any chain without GAS, bridging, or any delays

This framework brings true chain abstraction for users across all chains: EVM, non-EVM, alt L1s, L2s, L3s-- everything. Onboarding to crypto becomes dead simple- they create wallets using social logins, deposit some funds & the funds are instantly available for them to transact on any chain. Users get a completely web2-like UX with a single balance. There are no complexities in managing multiple gas tokens, bridging, or crosschain!

Building Consumer Apps with Chain Abstraction Framework

Consumer apps can leverage the chain abstraction framework to abstract away complexities for their users with a single account & single balance. More importantly, they can leverage the ability to spend the chain abstracted balance anywhere to unlock amazing new use cases never possible before.

With user balances enabled for transactions across any chain, the application can seamlessly operate on multiple chains. Apps can use various chains as their execution environments while hosting their multichain logic on NEAR. This setup allows apps to be present on one or multiple chains without the need for bridges, cross-chain complexities, or other technical hurdles.

This opens the door to a new wave of applications with unprecedented functionality and scope.

Ideas for consumer apps leveraging Chain Abstraction Framework

Chain-Abstracted Wallet

The simplest application could be a consumer friendly wallet. Today users are forced to manage separate wallets for different blockchains with fragmented balances across chains. To make things worse, they need multiple gas tokens just to interact with each chain, not to mention bridging funds back and forth.

With the chain abstraction framework, users simply get a single wallet that works seamlessly across all chains. No more fragmented balances—just a single, unified balance that’s usable anywhere. The wallet natively allows users to use any app on any chain just as if all of their funds were on that chain.

Chain-Abstracted trading: CEX-experience to purchase any memecoin, anywhere

Memecoins and tokens are spread across different chains today. There is no single application which allows them access to all these tokens without the pains of multiple wallets & bridging.

With a chain abstraction framework, developers could build trading apps that are exactly like CEXs. A single balance that could be used to purchase any token. The user never has to care about where the token lies, they just press a button and they get the token they need.

Chain-abstracted perp aggregation: Trade with a unified margin

There are various perp platforms with varying prices across them: Hyperliquid, GMX, dYdX, Aevo, Reya & more. Today users need a separate margin account for every chain & protocol and figure out ways to bridge across them to be able to trade everywhere.

However, by leveraging the chain abstraction framework, it’s possible to build a perp aggregator that allows seamless trading across these platforms using a single margin account and unified balance.

Chain-abstracted DEX aggregators: Route trades across chains

DEX aggregators today can only route swaps within a single blockchain, finding the best path for a swap, like USDC to ETH, within the liquidity available on that specific chain (e.g., Arbitrum).

With a Chain Abstracted Framework, DEX aggregators can route swaps across multiple chains. For example, swapping USDC to ETH could be seamlessly split across chains—20% on Ethereum, and 50% on Arbitrum—without users needing to worry about the details. They simply receive the ETH they need and can use it however they like.

The possibilities are endless! If you’re interested in building with the chain abstracted framework, reach out to us on Twitter.

About NEAR

NEAR is the chain abstraction stack, empowering builders to create apps that scale to billions of users and across all blockchains.

About Socket

Socket Protocol is the first Chain Abstraction Protocol, offering a modular, extensible, and composable stack that enables chain abstracted applications.