Ethereum’s EVM revolutionized blockchain programmability, introducing the world to smart contracts and setting the standard for decentralized applications. But it also came with limitations.&nbsp;Virtual machine based apps since the EVM can only process transactions as step-by-step instructions to be settled onchain sequentially. This makes perfect sense from the perspective of blockchains and how they update state via global consensus, but it doesn’t make sense from the perspective of users.&nbsp;VM-based apps come with a steep learning curve, requiring more technical knowledge and patience, forcing users to understand the steps necessary to accomplish their goals. It’s like going to a restaurant and needing to give the chef a step-by-step recipe for the meal you want instead of just ordering from a menu.Beyond this, conventional blockchain VMs have come with a number of other limitations:<ul><li>No privacy: public transactions and data sharing are the default, limiting widespread adoption of apps that process sensitive data.</li><li>No multichain support: apps are tied to specific chains with no native support for cross-chain composability, fragmenting liquidity and UX. To go multichain, developers have to manage multiple deployments across different chains, a logistical nightmare. </li><li>Inefficient state management: globally-shared state and reliance on onchain data and computation limits throughput, increases costs, and makes data sovereignty impossible.</li><li>Limited apps/no multiparty support: apps cannot support decentralized counterparty matching for multiparty applications like bartering, onchain coordination, or fully onchain DEXs. Dapps cannot match the functionality of their centralized Web2 counterparts.</li></ul>These constraints make it hard for developers to build and maintain truly user-friendly, future-proof applications with the flexibility needed to meet a constantly evolving landscape of user requirements and shifting market trends.&nbsp;Since the launch of the EVM, innovation in virtual machines has brought incremental benefits like higher performance, zero-knowledge (ZK) functionality, or enabling new programming languages.&nbsp;The engine at the core of Anoma’s Distributed Operating System, the ARM doesn’t iterate or build on top of previous blockchain VM technology; it’s designed and engineered from the ground up based on novel research. With the deployment of the ARM to protocol adapters in the Ethereum ecosystem, Anoma introduces the most significant upgrade to the dapp development stack since the EVM. The ARM brings a massive upgrade to existing blockchains and ecosystems by providing a private, intent-centric execution environment that works seamlessly with existing infrastructure – kicking off a new era of user-friendly, privacy-preserving apps primed for real-world adoption. Developers can now build fully-private, intent-centric applications that can run natively on any chain Anoma is deployed to.&nbsp;<h2 id="what-is-the-anoma-resource-machine-arm">What is the Anoma Resource Machine (ARM)?</h2>The ARM is a new type of virtual machine. While conventional virtual machines work by processing step-by-step transactions, the ARM is designed from the ground-up to process intents: user-defined outcomes and constraints. By enabling users to directly state their desired outcome, the ARM enables more intuitive and user-friendly applications.&nbsp;With intents, users can submit their desired end state without needing to worry about the steps necessary to achieve it. They can say, for example, ‘I want to borrow USDC against ETH at the best possible rate,” and Anoma handles the complexity for them, executing the order seamlessly across underlying infrastructure. While conventional VMs are designed around the needs of blockchains, the ARM is designed around the needs of users, including developers.&nbsp;Building apps on conventional blockchain VMs means building with smart contracts that are rigid and difficult to upgrade. When managing multichain deployments, developers are faced with complicated dependencies that make upgrading time consuming and expensive.&nbsp;With Anoma, a single app can be built, run, and upgraded natively across several chains at once. For users, this provides the most seamless multichain experience possible. For developers, it eliminates the risk of choosing the wrong deployment chain, speeds up go-to-market, slashes maintenance overhead, reduces production costs, and helps future proof their app.&nbsp;<h2 id="introducing-the-resource-model">Introducing the Resource Model</h2>To make this possible, Anoma introduces a completely new state model: the <a href="https://docs.anoma.net/learn/anomas-state-model?ref=blog.anoma.net">Resource Model</a>. Inspired by the commitment/nullifier system originally pioneered by Zcash, the resource model combines the best of UTXO and account-based models.Rather than using step-by-step transactions to update state, Anoma’s state model is organized around atomic units of state called resources. Resources are the key to writing intent-centric applications, and can represent anything from tokens to messages and arbitrary data.Compared to conventional VM transactions that can only access state (including assets) on a single blockchain, resource data can live anywhere: on any blockchain, any user device, any network node, etc. This model gives developers much more control and flexibility over their applications, which can now exist dynamically across several chains and access data and state anywhere.&nbsp;This model also provides the most advanced privacy features ever seen in Web3.&nbsp;Privacy isn’t about hiding or obscuring information, it’s about the appropriate flow of information. For example, it’s appropriate to share your medical records with your doctor, but not with the whole world. Since resources can live anywhere, user data can live on user devices by default, and only be shared with specific parties in the broader network as necessary.&nbsp;The ARM solves the blockchain privacy problem, enabling fine-tuned control over data sharing on any public blockchain, today and in the future. For example, you can write a payments app with compliant privacy features where data must be disclosed to a specific party for payments exceeding a certain threshold. Users can also share specific data with specific parties for auditing purposes. This is more than just a ‘nice-to-have’, it’s required to achieve real world relevance for apps that process sensitive user data.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/11/Anoma-Resource-machine-02.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1920" height="1080" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/11/Anoma-Resource-machine-02.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/11/Anoma-Resource-machine-02.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/11/Anoma-Resource-machine-02.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/11/Anoma-Resource-machine-02.jpg 1920w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>The basic anatomy of an ARM transaction</figcaption></figure>In an ARM transaction, resources are coupled with resource logics, which encode the rules for how resources can be used. To get from user intent to satisfied outcome, resources can be created (e.g. asset minting) and consumed (e.g. asset burning), while the ARM enforces the rules for valid state updates in line with the user’s stated preferences and conditions.&nbsp;<h2 id="the-arm-and-protocol-adapters">The ARM and Protocol Adapters</h2>The ARM comes to life on existing blockchains by being deployed on Protocol Adapters (PAs). PAs are smart contract implementations of the ARM that provide interoperability between the ARM and existing virtual machines.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/11/image1.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1999" height="1125" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/11/image1.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/11/image1.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/11/image1.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/11/image1.jpg 1999w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>The ARM can be deployed on any number of blockchains via protocol adapters</figcaption></figure><a href="https://x.com/anoma/status/1990798499563385222?s=20&ref=blog.anoma.net">With the ARM now deployed to the Ethereum PA</a>, developers can build privacy-preserving applications with native intents for Ethereum. The ARM provides full interoperability with the EVM, so developers can leverage existing assets, smart contracts, and data on Ethereum.Thanks to the ARM’s unmatched data protection capabilities, developers can incorporate industry-leading privacy guarantees into existing DeFi and payments applications, enable private voting for DAOs, build private auctions, leverage private oracle data, and more.By building natively on the ARM, developers can not only unlock Anoma’s native intents and privacy features, they can be ready to deploy their app on any and every chain that gets a PA in the future. Applications can select different providers for different services (e.g. ordering from Ethereum, storage from Arweave, and solving from Chorus One).The ARM also enables native gas fee abstraction, so apps can offer superior UX by eliminating the need for their users to hold specific tokens to pay fees.&nbsp;<h2 id="what%E2%80%99s-next">What’s next</h2>With the Ethereum PA deployed, developers can now build privacy-preserving, intent-centric apps for Ethereum, and apps like <a href="http://x.com/anomapay?ref=blog.anoma.net">AnomaPay</a> can come to life. But Anoma on Ethereum is just the first step. From here, PAs will be launched on key L2 rollups to bring the benefits of Anoma to the most widely used chains across the Ethereum ecosystem. With the launch of each new PA, Anoma apps like AnomaPay can automatically work on those chains.The ARM marks the start of a new era for decentralized app development. Dapps are no longer rigid, constrained by their deployment chains, and incapable of protecting user data. They’re freeform, flexible, and can provide user-friendly privacy options for the first time in Web3. The ARM is the missing link that enables crypto applications to finally compete with the functionality and experience of Web2, so Web3 can become just ‘the web’.

Introducing the ARM: The Next-Generation of Virtual Machines Begins

Blockchain infrastructure has come a long way since the early days of crypto. From Bitcoin to Ethereum, the rise of L2s, stablecoins, modularity, and the ZK revolution, blockchains have become faster, cheaper, more scalable, interoperable, efficient and programmable.It seems like every day there’s a new L1 or L2 launching, bringing improvements to some corner of the Web3 stack. But when is enough enough with innovation at the infrastructure level? When will we arrive at the promised land of applications that people care about beyond the crypto bubble? When will Web3 finally take its rightful place and just be ‘the web’?More and more protocol teams are realizing that, without apps people care about, innovating at the infrastructure layer is a game of diminishing returns. So they’re building their own apps to dogfood their tech and show the world what it’s capable of.&nbsp;It’s a good step in the right direction, but without a unified layer of abstraction on top of existing and future infrastructure, we’re still caught in the trap of fragmentation, broken composability, bad UX, and developer friction. We’re stuck in an immature, awkward teenager phase where innovation outpaces ease of adoption, where increasing complexity keeps the next wave of builders and users at bay.Web3 today is like the world of personal computers before operating systems like Windows and Mac streamlined the developer and user experience. When computers had a steep learning curve, requiring more technical knowledge, patience, manual configuration, and hands-on interaction with things like command-line interfaces. The blockchain landscape today is like a complex maze of computer hardware without an OS to make development and user interaction simple enough for mainstream adoption.<h2 id="aiming-upward">Aiming upward</h2>Anoma is not another chain. It’s a higher level of abstraction that shifts innovation upward from infrastructure to the application layer.&nbsp;By unifying the landscape of existing and future infrastructure under a single application layer, Anoma makes it possible for builders and users to stop worrying about the constantly evolving world of L1s and L2s. Builders can focus on building apps that people love, and users can get a simple, unified experience across every underlying chain.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/09/Anoma-Upward-2.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1920" height="1080" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/09/Anoma-Upward-2.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/09/Anoma-Upward-2.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/09/Anoma-Upward-2.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/09/Anoma-Upward-2.jpg 1920w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>Anoma unifies infrastructure under a single application layer</figcaption></figure>Anoma frees users and developers from the complexity of underlying infrastructure so blockchain can evolve into a more mature phase. The thesis is simple: we need to move the space upward to the application layer or Web3 has no chance of breaking through to the mainstream.&nbsp;Crypto innovation has hit a ceiling. It’s time to move past the same old chain games. It’s time to aim higher. Upward.This is not about discounting or minimizing the need for continued development at the base layers. Since Anoma can work with any blockchain, today and tomorrow, infrastructure can continue to evolve and improve while users and developers get an uninterrupted experience at the OS level. The space can continue to move forward across the entire stack, and builders can be ready for whatever the future holds.But we need to recognize that we won’t win by making marginal improvements to infrastructure for the next 10 years. We win by giving the world apps and experiences that people love. We win by providing a real alternative to the traditional status quo. We need to be more ambitious. We need moonshots. It’s time to aim higher. Upward.

Upward: Shifting Innovation to the Application Layer

The crypto and Web3 space has seen a never-ending rollout of new blockchains since Bitcoin was invented. From layer-1 and layer-2 networks to modular and app-specific chains, each new launch brings incremental improvements and new approaches to solve long-standing problems.&nbsp;But each new chain adds complexity that developers and users are forced to navigate. The result is a patchwork ecosystem of fragmented networks, applications, wallets, liquidity, and users. This trend toward fragmentation is a major barrier to developer and user adoption, and keeps the focus on infrastructure at the expense of applications.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image6.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1999" height="1106" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/06/image6.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/06/image6.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/06/image6.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image6.jpg 1999w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>The current status quo: complexity and fragmentation</figcaption></figure>With Web3 hype cycles measured in weeks, not months or years, the choice of which chain to deploy an app to brings huge risks. If a developer launches their app on chain X one day, and users and liquidity flock to chain Y the next, it means months of wasted development time and capital. It’s one big game of musical chairs. Teams are forced to make risky bets on which chain will win, or manage multiple deployments across different chains, creating extra development and maintenance overhead that puts them at a competitive disadvantage.For users, fragmentation is a nightmare for the experience of using blockchains. They’re forced to juggle multiple wallets, seed phrases, apps, chains, and bridges to do even relatively basic things. For anything involving multiple chains, users have to go down rabbit holes to find optimal routes, navigate complicated multi-step interactions, and sign a time-consuming series of transactions.What if there was a better way to build and use Web3 applications?<h2 id="introducing-web3%E2%80%99s-os">Introducing Web3’s OS</h2>Anoma is a decentralized operating system that unifies the fragmented Web3 landscape into a single, cohesive environment. Anoma will connect existing blockchains across ecosystems like Ethereum, Solana, and more. But what does an operating system mean in the context of Web3?&nbsp;Let’s look at the example of Windows and what it did to revolutionize the way people interact with and develop applications for PCs. Windows unified the PC environment, creating a single cohesive interface that users and developers could interact with regardless of the underlying hardware. No matter which type of CPU a computer was built on, users could get the same familiar experience, and developers could write a single application that could work on many different types of computers. This kicked off the personal computing era, making PCs accessible enough to become a household device.&nbsp;Yet Web3 is still stuck in the pre-Windows era. If Web3 networks are like decentralized ‘world computers’, blockchains represent the underlying CPUs that handle all the ‘processing’. Today, developers are still stuck writing applications for specific blockchains, and users are forced to interact directly with complex low-level infrastructure. This keeps Web3 stuck in an immature state, without the types of user-friendly applications needed to break through the transition into mainstream relevance.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/Web3-landscape_V2.5.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="2000" height="1125" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/06/Web3-landscape_V2.5.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/06/Web3-landscape_V2.5.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/06/Web3-landscape_V2.5.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w2400/2025/06/Web3-landscape_V2.5.jpg 2400w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>Anoma OS unifies Web3 into a single cohesive system</figcaption></figure>Akin to Windows for Web3, Anoma introduces a new approach to dapp development. It enables developers to build one app that works seamlessly across any underlying blockchain, and to provide a seamless experience for their users, free from the complexity that exists today. Developers are no longer faced with the risky decision of deploying on a specific blockchain. With Anoma, their app is automatically compatible with any underlying chain, and they’re ready for the next big blockchain launch, whenever it happens.&nbsp;This unified approach can significantly speed up the time and reduce the cost of deploying a dapp, and eliminates the overhead of juggling multiple deployments across different chains. With Anoma, dapp teams are free to focus on what matters most: their application and their users, leaving the complexity of underlying infrastructure and multichain interoperability to Anoma.&nbsp;Anoma also provides the most flexible and adaptable development environment possible, enabling developers to build new types of applications that haven't been possible in Web3. This includes full-featured Web2-style applications like Uber or Kickstarter (but fully decentralized), and the types of automated experiences that users have come to expect from AI-powered applications. This means that Web3 won’t be left behind as users expect increasing ease of use and more natural interactions from the applications they use. Anoma is not yet another blockchain bringing incremental improvements to the existing paradigm. It’s a fundamentally new type of architecture optimized for application development and user experience, paving the way for Web3 to reach its full potential as the ‘world computer’.<h2 id="the-power-of-intents">The power of intents</h2>A key component of how Anoma provides a superior developer and user experience is by introducing a new paradigm of intent-centric application development.Intents are how humans naturally interact with applications. They’re the outcomes or goals that users want to achieve, along with any preferences or conditions for achieving those goals. A user opens an application because they want to trade X for Y at the best possible price, or to purchase a product that matches their specific needs and requirements. With Anoma, developers can write applications that process user intents into verifiable outcomes, a quantum leap forward in user and developer experience compared to what exists today.&nbsp;Intent-centric app development involves a shift from imperative to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarative_programming?ref=blog.anoma.net" rel="noreferrer">declarative programming</a>. With imperative programming, you need to write a series of step-by-step instructions for the computer to process. By contrast, with declarative programming you simply declare the end state you want to achieve without needing to specify how to achieve it. This approach saves time and improves the developer experience by minimizing unnecessary complexity. It’s the difference between needing to tell a chef every step involved in making your meal vs ordering the dish you want and letting the chef handle the preparation.While Web2 apps adopted intents and declarative programming long ago, the approach isn’t yet the standard in Web3. Indeed, the move from imperative to declarative programming (particularly the shift from jquery to react) is part of the secret sauce that led Web2 applications to take over the world. Because Web3 applications are tied to on-chain virtual machines (e.g. the EVM), which run on an imperative, transaction-centric model, dapp developers are still stuck writing step-by-step instructions.Not only is this an inefficient and inexpressive way to write applications, it forces users to understand and interact with the complexities of the underlying infrastructure. They have to figure out which wallets and UIs to use, evaluate bridges, judge the risks involved, and then approve an often complex series of transactions.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image3.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1736" height="874" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/06/image3.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/06/image3.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/06/image3.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image3.jpg 1736w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>Users communicate their intent, Anoma handles the complexity</figcaption></figure>With Anoma, users can simply communicate their desired outcome and let the system handle the complexity for them. No matter how complex an operation is or how many chains are involved, Anoma apps can provide a single, simple interaction for the user. Dapps can provide more seamless, automated experiences, comparable to those users have come to expect from LLMs and chatbots.&nbsp;Some Web3 protocols today are designed to process intents, but typically only involve specific use cases, such as cross-chain swaps. Anoma introduces the first system for processing generalized intents, that is, any type of intent that can be used for any type of application. Generalized intents are the key to building apps that can match the capabilities of Web2 without relying on any centralized components. <h2 id="how-does-it-work">How does it work?</h2>Anoma provides a level of abstraction that exists on top of underlying blockchains. This is similar to how an operating system provides a level of abstraction on top of computer CPUs that developers and users can interact with rather than needing to interact directly with the hardware. Anoma is designed around three basic layers: an application layer, a networking layer, and a settlement layer. <figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image1.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1920" height="1836" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/06/image1.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/06/image1.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/06/image1.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image1.jpg 1920w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>The 3 basic layers of Anoma OS</figcaption></figure>The application layer is where developers build applications and users interact with them. This is analogous to the UIs that we’re used to in Windows or MacOS. It includes a development interface for building intent-centric applications, powered not by a virtual machine (VM) and smart contracts, as in the case of conventional blockchains, but by an Anoma innovation called the intent machine (IM). While VMs work by processing transactions into state updates, the IM works by processing intents into state updates. The IM model is the key to bringing intent-centric applications to Web3.The networking layer is a decentralized peer-to-peer network made up of intent gossip nodes and solvers that run the Anoma software. When a user submits an intent to an app interface, gossip nodes broadcast it across peers in the network. Special nodes called solvers watch for these intents and solve them by carrying out the necessary operations and settling transactions on underlying blockchains. Solvers can be specialized in certain types of operations, or more generalized for a wider range of applications.<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image2.png" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="1999" height="1129" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2025/06/image2.png 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2025/06/image2.png 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2025/06/image2.png 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2025/06/image2.png 1999w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"></figure>The networking layer also handles counterparty discovery, the key to any type of application that involves multiple parties.&nbsp;For example, a decentralized token swap can involve two or more parties. Imagine Alice has token X that they want to trade for token Y, and Bob has token Y that they want to trade for token X. This creates a balanced transaction because the intents equal out. More likely, a swap can involve more than two parties: Alice wants to trade token W for token Z, Bob wants to trade token X for token Y, Cameron wants to trade token Y for token W, and Dave wants to trade token Z for token X. This is also a balanced transaction that solvers can solve.&nbsp;Generalized intents on Anoma are fully composable, which means developers can write applications that rely on interaction between multiple users and multiple operations across several blockchains, and solvers can combine intents from different users together to solve more complex operations.The only way to do counterparty discovery in Web3 today is by relying on centralized components like servers, or by putting the entire process on-chain, which is impractical in terms of efficiency and cost. With Anoma, intents can be arbitrarily complex, and the larger the pool of intents, the more ways that solvers can find to balance them. In his way, apps on Anoma can involve interactions between any number of users while maintaining full decentralization. This enables new types of applications that are impossible in Web3 today.Finally, the settlement layer is where intents are ultimately settled on underlying blockchains. This layer is essentially the motherboard of the world computer. Intents can be settled across any number of blockchains, from L1s and L2s to app-specific chains for file storage, data availability, oracles, and more. Anoma connects to existing blockchains and enables those networks to seamlessly operate with the broader Anoma system.<h2 id="powering-a-universal-app-layer-for-web3">Powering a universal app layer for Web3</h2>By introducing an intent-centric paradigm for blockchain architecture and application development, Anoma enables a universal application layer to serve all of Web3.&nbsp;In the current paradigm, the focus is still overwhelmingly on blockchains and blockchain infrastructure rather than on what applications actually need.&nbsp;But what if we could redesign blockchains from scratch to make them more user friendly and better suited for hosting applications? The good news is that we don’t have to. Anoma reexamines decentralized systems from a first-principles approach, to create a more application-centric and user-centric future for Web3. Best yet, Anoma is fully compatible with existing blockchains, so any chain can benefit from intents and developers can write one app with universal compatibility.Just as Web2 apps can work seamlessly and update state across every device a user owns, Anoma enables dapps to roam seamlessly across every blockchain a user has state on at once. This is the sort of experience users have come to expect, but it hasn’t existed in Web3 until now. Anoma bridges the gap between Web2 and Web3 applications and experiences, so Web3 can finally serve as the backbone of a new internet.&nbsp;The rigid focus on blockchains and VMs has failed to give us a rich application layer to compete with Web2, imposing unnecessary complexity on developers and users. Anoma is Web3 without the complexity, enabling the space to evolve beyond infrastructure so developers can finally focus on building apps, not chains.&nbsp;Because the future of crypto isn’t more infrastructure. It’s infrastructure you don’t even notice.

Build Apps, Not Chains: Introducing Web3’s OS

Note: This blog was updated on September 2, 2025 to reflect the latest plans for Anoma’s mainnet rollout<h3 id="what-is-anoma">What is Anoma?</h3>The word “Anoma” can mean many things. Here we will talk about two: the Anoma protocol and the Anoma network. The Anoma protocol is a distributed operating system for intent-centric applications, and the Anoma network is the interlinked graph of computers running this protocol.An operating system:<ol><li>Abstracts diverse hardware behind a universal interface, and</li><li>Provides an environment in which applications can run.</li></ol>Three classes of operating systems are predominant today:<ol><li>Desktop operating systems such as Windows, Linux, and Mac OS.</li><li>Mobile operating systems such as iOS and Android.</li><li>Web browsers such as Chrome and Safari.</li></ol>These three classes of operating systems all fit this definition, but differ in what hardware they seek to abstract and what kind of environment they seek to provide. Desktop and mobile operating systems are concerned with abstracting physical hardware, while web browsers already run on an existing OS and can make use of the hardware abstractions provided by that OS. While all three classes of OSs are interested in providing an environment in which multiple applications can run safely, mobile OSs and web browsers are typically more concerned with limiting application permissions and cleanly sandboxing application code.Similar to web browsers, Anoma is an operating system that runs on top of an existing “base-level” operating system which abstracts differences in physical hardware. Similar to mobile operating systems, Anoma provides a very clean sandbox for applications, up to the point of making it safe and incentive-compatible for nodes to run code they receive over the network. Rather than seeking to abstract the hardware of one computer, a distributed operating system such as Anoma aims to abstract the hardware of many networked computers so that applications can treat this network as if it were a single abstract machine: specifically, an <a href="https://zenodo.org/records/10654543?ref=blog.anoma.net">intent machine</a>.<h3 id="what-does-anoma-mainnet-mean">What does Anoma mainnet mean?</h3>By mainnet, we mean a version of Anoma which allows developers to build and deploy real applications that can integrate with existing tokens such as ETH, BTC, DAI, USDC. This stage of mainnet does not yet come with any native Anoma token. The most important interface (really, the only external interface) in all of the Anoma protocol is the application development interface, and our first priority is to allow developers to start building applications using it.The basic architectural concept for the initial mainnet version – nicknamed "Resource Plasma" after the concept first described in<a href="https://ethresear.ch/t/rfc-draft-anoma-as-the-universal-intent-machine-for-ethereum/19109?ref=blog.anoma.net"> this post</a> – is to primarily leverage existing service providers for ordering, compute, and storage services (often bundled together as “blockchains”, and some “solvers” or “searchers”) and knit these service providers together using the Anoma node and P2P system into a distributed network capable of supporting intent-centric applications built using the resource machine.With the Minimum Viable Resource Plasma (MVRP) architecture, Anoma provides three things:<ol><li>A framework to write native intent-centric applications, and</li><li>A network allowing those applications to instantly leverage existing services and liquidity, and</li><li>A clear interface for service providers to easily support new classes of applications.</li></ol>In a diagram, the intent flow in MVRP looks like this:<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card kg-card-hascaption"><img src="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/2024/11/Inte-flow-2--1-.jpg" class="kg-image" alt="" loading="lazy" width="2000" height="1125" srcset="https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w600/2024/11/Inte-flow-2--1-.jpg 600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1000/2024/11/Inte-flow-2--1-.jpg 1000w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w1600/2024/11/Inte-flow-2--1-.jpg 1600w, https://blog.anoma.net/content/images/size/w2400/2024/11/Inte-flow-2--1-.jpg 2400w" sizes="(min-width: 720px) 720px"><figcaption>Intent Flow in Anoma's Minimum Viable Resource Plasma</figcaption></figure>With the Anoma mainnet:<ul><li>Operators will be able to run Anoma nodes and participate in the intent gossip network, solving, and settlement per their preferences.</li><li>Solvers will be able to combine Anoma intent liquidity and EVM intent liquidity and settle atomically in a single transaction.</li><li>Developers will be able to write intent-centric applications using the resource machine and Juvix, with transparent, succinct, and zero-knowledge proof options.</li><li>Users will be able to define their own security model, choosing service providers for network relay, compute, storage, and ordering in their intents, which the Anoma network will then coordinate and the application logic will then enforce.</li></ul><h3 id="how-will-anoma-be-deployed">How will Anoma be deployed?</h3>For the past few years, Anoma ecosystem teams have been conducting (and<a href="https://art.anoma.net/?ref=blog.anoma.net"> publishing</a>) research and developing<a href="https://github.com/anoma/anoma?ref=blog.anoma.net"> early prototypes</a>. This has led to the overall system architecture and current plan to deploy Anoma in a series of phases designed to facilitate the collection and incorporation of developer and ecosystem feedback with rapid iterations, and to start building real applications. The following plan is an initial proposal and is subject to change at any time in the future. Please follow <a href="https://x.com/anoma?ref=blog.anoma.net" rel="noreferrer">Anoma on X</a> and other communication channels to be up to date.The Anoma roadmap to mainnet consists of three basic phases:<ol><li>Devnets, the first phase, are focused on allowing developers to start building Anoma applications, getting a feel for the system, and providing feedback which will be incorporated into design or ergonomic changes as necessary. Devnets are aimed exclusively at developers – beware, here be dragons! – and will iterate until there is a stable application development API and a handful of solid apps.</li><li>Testnets, the second phase, are focused on allowing users to start playing with (testnet) Anoma applications built by the early developers, and providing feedback on UX and functionality which will be incorporated into design or application changes as necessary. Testnets are aimed at both developers and users, and should be more stable than devnets, but changes will still happen on a periodic cadence.</li><li>Mainnet, the third phase, includes a stable application development interface and full support for the Resource Plasma architecture. Mainnet will not include an Anoma-specific consensus at the beginning – but thanks to the Plasma architecture, this is not necessary for developers and users to build and use real applications with real value. In this stage, the focus will be on making Anoma applications valuable for users, and coordinating further protocol iteration and efficiency improvements as necessary to achieve that. The mainnet version will first include deployments of the protocol adapter (allowing intent settlement) to the Ethereum mainnet and Ethereum L2s, followed by other chains and ecosystems. Successive versions after launch will bring additional options to applications including private solving, FHE, MPC, threshold encryption, on-demand consensus, and Chimera chains.</li></ol>Thanks for reading! Please leave any feedback and questions on the <a href="https://research.anoma.net/t/post-discussion-anoma-roadmap-to-launch/860?ref=blog.anoma.net" rel="noreferrer">forums</a>.

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