The blockchain scalability landscape has evolved significantly in recent years, with Layer-2s (L2s) and sharding the two dominant approaches.
Ethereum, a key player in the crypto industry, has embraced rollup-centric L2 to scale its network, while the NEAR protocol has taken a different path, choosing to scale via sharding. Both strategies offer unique solutions for blockchain scalability, but also present their distinctive challenges.
Ethereum Layer 2: A Brief Focused Approach
NEARWEEK, a publication of the NEAR protocol, praised Ethereum for gaining considerable attention for its innovative stack-focused scaling strategy. An L2 protocol is built on top of an existing blockchain to improve scalability, performance, and privacy. This is accomplished by executing state transitions off-chain from the layer 1 (L1) on which they are based and committing state roots and transactional data in the underlying L1.
NEAR considers the driving philosophy behind rollups to be the belief that a rollup can outperform the underlying L1 in terms of performance due to decreased consensus overhead. However, in practice, NEAR believes that the overall scale achieved by the cumulative packs together has been somewhat disappointing, barely surpassing what a single cumulative pack can deliver.
However, data from the L2 analytics platform L2Beat offers a contrasting view due to the increase in L2 activity over the past year, as shown in the chart below.
Furthermore, the review of the top 10 Ethereum L2 shows that Arbitrum One and zkSync Era are close to Ethereum’s monthly transaction count. Additionally, Immutable X and Arbitrum Nova have outpaced Ethereum’s growth in average transactions per second (TPS) for seven days. Notably, Ethereum had a higher active TPS than any L2 scaling solution on the network on July 3.
| # | Name | TPS of days gone by | 7D change | maximum daily TPS | 30D account | Data source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ethereal | 12.29 | 6.48% | 22.37 (09 December 2022) | 31.45 million | Blockchain RPCs |
| 2 | decision one | 9.69 | -4.17% | 31.64 (March 23, 2023) | 24.81 million | Blockchain RPCs |
| 3 | It was zkSync | 8.63 | -14.74% | 12.00 (May 16, 2023) | 22.27 million | Blockchain RPCs |
| 4 | ON main network | 6.00 | -12.97% | 9.26 (January 12, 2023) | 14.82 million | Blockchain RPCs |
| 5 | dYdX | 3.09 | -38.54% | 11.45 (February 15, 2022) | 9.42 million | closed API |
| 6 | immutable X | 2.01 | 7.47% | 39.35 (March 11, 2022) | 5.67 million | closed API |
| 7 | star web | 1.79 | -9.17% | 3.05 (May 16, 2023) | 4.61 million | browser API |
| 8 | a new decision | 1.34 | 18.15% | 10.93 (April 27, 2023) | 2.99 million | Blockchain RPCs |
| 9 | Appendix | 0.95 | 2.27% | 1.38 (April 13, 2023) | 2.68 million | closed API |
| 10 | zkSync Lite | 0.89 | -27.20% | 3.29 (March 21, 2023) | 2.52M | browser API |
| eleven | polygon zkEVM | 0.64 | -5.13% | 0.82 (June 13, 2023) | 1.34 million | Blockchain RPCs |
Data of L2Beat.com
However, the main cause of the lackluster performance suggested by NEAR is attributed to the fact that popular Ethereum decentralized applications (dApps) operate on almost all rollups, resulting in similar transactions being “duplicated” in different rollups. .
Chunk-centric approach to NEAR
NEAR Protocol, by contrast, has chosen to address scalability through sharding, which divides the network into distinct segments built directly into the protocol. According to NEARWEEK, every piece of the NEAR architecture can be compared to an optimistic summary of the Ethereum approach.
The key advantage of NEAR’s sharding approach lies in its compatibility, allowing applications in one shard to interact with applications in another shard natively. This homogeneous partitioning model allows applications to interact in the same way, regardless of whether they are deployed to the same shard, thus preventing developers from deciding which shard to deploy their applications to.
In addition, NEAR’s sharding model offers faster transaction finality, typically within two to three seconds, surpassing extended finality times in the digest universe.
While NEAR Protocol does not list your real-time TPS in the block explorer, it can be calculated based on the most recent block data. TO CryptoSlate NEAR transaction analysis block explorer it showed an average TPS of about 5.7 transactions per second on July 4. This snapshot of NEAR’s TPS aligns with the top five L2s on the Ethereum network. The NEAR community envisions the protocol’s potential through sharding to reach 100,000 TPS in the future.
Contrasting design philosophies
The different approaches to scaling taken by Ethereum and NEAR highlight their contrasting design philosophies. While Ethereum prioritizes resiliency, keeping a simple L1 protocol design, NEARWEEK stated that NEAR Protocol leans towards a simplified user experience, taking on additional protocol complexity to ensure a superior UX.
Furthermore, it is important to note that NEAR is not intended to be “just an L1”, as it seeks to function as a Blockchain Operating System (BOS), providing a universal layer for browsing and discovering open web experiences. Through the BOS, NEAR intends to
“Empower developers and users of various blockchains, including Ethereum Layer 2, to build and use applications in a multitude of blockchain ecosystems.”
More details on NEAR’s BOS vision can be found on his Half account.
Blockchain scalability remains a complex and crucial issue in the world of cryptocurrencies. As Ethereum’s rollup-focused L2s and NEAR sharding evolve, it will be intriguing to see which approach proves more effective in the long run.
