High-level Architecture

Shardeum is an EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain built to bring India onchain - the world’s largest untapped on-chain market - by offering low fees, fast finality, and scalable performance for both developers and end users.

Core Technology Stack

Shardeum is a sovereign blockchain designed with a layered internal architecture, where core responsibilities such as execution, consensus, networking, and state management are cleanly separated while operating as a single, cohesive system.

This design allows each layer to be independently optimized without fragmenting security, execution, or state ownership. By combining tight system integration with clear separation of concerns, Shardeum achieves high performance, operational resilience, and long-term extensibility - without relying on external execution or shared security models.

1. Consensus and Networking Layer

The consensus and networking layer is responsible for validator coordination, transaction ordering, and block finality across the network. This layer is optimized for:

Proof-of-Stake security model with BFT consensus and deterministic finality,
strong safety and liveness guarantees,
efficient peer-to-peer communication across a distributed validator set,
delegation of SHM by token holders to validators,
economic security through slashing protection and other penalties, and
fork prevention and resolution.

Separating consensus and networking from execution enables the protocol to scale validator participation and network throughput without coupling performance directly to application logic.

2. State and Data Management Layer

Shardeum includes a dedicated layer for state storage, access, and synchronization, ensuring that account balances, contract state, and historical data remain consistent and verifiable across the network. This layer is designed to:

efficiently manage on-chain state growth,
support fast read/write access for applications,
maintain consistency across validators under real-world load, and
manage staking and delegation records.

By treating state as a first-class architectural component, Shardeum improves performance predictability while preserving correctness and security.

3. Execution Layer (EVM Compatibility)

Shardeum uses a mature, open-source EVM execution environment as its execution layer, enabling full compatibility with established Ethereum tooling and developer workflows. This layer is responsible for:

deterministic smart contract execution,
gas metering and fee accounting,
transaction validity checks, and
producing state transition outputs for blocks finalized by the consensus layer.

By maintaining strong EVM compatibility, Shardeum allows developers to deploy applications with minimal friction while ensuring predictable behavior and production-grade reliability.

Solidity & Vyper support - Deploy existing Ethereum smart contracts without modification
Ethereum tooling - Compatible with MetaMask, Hardhat, Foundry, Remix, and other Ethereum tools
Web3 API - Standard JSON-RPC endpoints for seamless integration
Leading dApps - Enable EVM-compatible deployments of widely used Ethereum protocols, supporting applications inspired by systems such as Uniswap and Aave for high-growth markets like India.

4. Protocol Modularity and Upgradeability

While Shardeum operates as a single sovereign network, its internal components are designed with protocol-level modularity in mind. This approach enables:

upgrades without disruptive redesigns,
targeted performance improvements at specific layers, and
long-term evolution of the protocol as usage scales.

By integrating proven open-source components within a cohesive architecture, Shardeum balances innovation with operational stability - allowing the network to evolve without compromising reliability.

5. Application Layer (Smart Contracts & dApps)

The application layer provides a fully EVM-compatible environment for smart contracts and decentralized applications built on top of the Shardeum protocol. This layer hosts application logic, user-facing contracts, and middleware frameworks, while relying on the underlying execution, consensus, and state layers for correctness, performance, and security. By preserving standard EVM interfaces and tooling, the application layer enables developers to deploy existing Solidity-based contracts and build decentralized applications using familiar Ethereum workflows.

Network Architecture

Network Architecture describes how the core protocol layers are deployed and operated in a live network environment. While the Core Technology Stack defines the internal software components of the Shardeum protocol, the sections below present the operational view of the system - including node roles, runtime data flows, and infrastructure services - that enables applications and users to interact with the network at scale.

Chain Specifications

Chain ID (Protocol): shardeum_8118-1
Chain ID (EVM): 8118 (hex: 0x1fb6)
Native Token: SHM
Block Time: ~2-3 seconds
Consensus: Proof of Stake (Tendermint BFT)

Shardeum’s network is operated and secured by distinct participant roles, each contributing to the network’s security, availability, and decentralization.

1. Validators

Validators are responsible for operating the core infrastructure of the network and maintaining consensus. Their responsibilities include:

proposing and validating blocks,
participating in network consensus,
processing and validating transactions, and
securing the network by staking SHM

Validators must stake SHM to be eligible for consensus participation, with voting power proportional to the amount staked.

Minimum stake (current): 1 SHM

Unbonding period: 21 days

2. Delegators

Delegators are SHM holders who contribute to network security by staking indirectly through validators. Delegators can:

delegate SHM to active validators,
earn a share of staking rewards, and
participate in governance as governance features are introduced.

Delegation allows token holders to support decentralization without operating validator infrastructure.

3. Full Nodes

Full nodes support the network by maintaining a complete and independently verifiable copy of the blockchain. Their functions include:

maintaining the full blockchain state and history,
serving RPC requests for applications and tooling,
relaying transactions and blocks across the network, and
providing data services to light clients and external systems.

While full nodes do not participate in consensus, they play a critical role in improving network reliability, decentralization, and data availability.

In addition to validator nodes and full nodes, the network includes supporting infrastructure components that provide access, visibility, and historical data services.

RPC nodes are full nodes configured to expose JSON-RPC interfaces for wallets, dApps, and developer tooling, enabling application connectivity and transaction submission. Detailed endpoint configuration and usage are documented in the RPC node section.

Archive nodes are specialized full nodes that retain an unpruned, complete history of the blockchain, supporting explorers, analytics, and historical data queries.

Indexing infrastructure processes blocks and contract events to power explorers and analytics, enabling efficient search and historical views without participating in consensus or serving as a primary network interface.

Developer Integration

Smart Contract Development

Developers can deploy smart contracts using:

// Standard Solidity contracts work without modification
pragma solidity ^0.8.0;
 
contract Example {
    function hello() public pure returns (string memory) {
        return "Hello Shardeum";
    }
}

Network Connection

Connect to Shardeum using standard Ethereum tools:

RPC Endpoint: https://api.shardeum.org Chain ID: 8118 Block Explorer: https://explorer.shardeum.org

Transaction Lifecycle (High-Level)

The following illustrates the high-level lifecycle of a transaction on the Shardeum network.

User submits transaction via Web3 wallet or dApp
Transaction is broadcast to validator nodes
Validators include transaction in proposed block
Consensus is reached on block validity
Block is committed and transaction is finalized
State is updated and receipt is generated

What Developers Can Rely On

Shardeum is designed to provide the following protocol-level reliabilities to developers, users, and operators:

Deterministic Execution - Smart contract execution is deterministic and verifiable across validators, ensuring consistent outcomes for identical transactions.
Finality and State Consistency - Once a block is finalized, transactions are irreversible and state is immediately consistent across the network, enabling reliable application logic and time-sensitive use cases.
EVM Compatibility - Shardeum preserves standard EVM behavior and interfaces, allowing developers to deploy existing Solidity contracts and use familiar tooling without modification.
Predictable Transaction Costs - Transaction fees are denominated in SHM and designed to remain predictable under normal network conditions, supporting sustainable application economics.
Availability and Fault Tolerance - The network is designed to tolerate validator failures and adversarial conditions while maintaining liveness and data availability.

Security Model

Shardeum’s security model combines economic incentives, protocol-level safeguards, and operational best practices to protect the network against malicious behavior, failures, and unintended disruptions.

Economic Security

The network is secured through a Proof-of-Stake model that economically aligns validators with the long-term health of the protocol. Key mechanisms include:

stake-backed validator participation in consensus,
stake-weighted voting power, and
penalty mechanisms for protocol violations such as downtime and double-signing.

These incentives ensure that validators are financially motivated to behave honestly and maintain high availability.

Technical Security

Shardeum’s protocol design incorporates multiple layers of technical protection to ensure correctness, finality, and fault tolerance. These include:

a rigorously reviewed and audited codebase built on proven, battle-tested open-source components,
a secure and deterministic EVM execution environment aligned with established Ethereum security assumptions, and
Byzantine Fault Tolerant consensus ensuring safety and liveness in the presence of faulty or malicious validators.

Operational Security

Operational resilience is achieved through decentralization, observability, and ongoing maintenance. This includes:

a distributed validator set to avoid single points of failure,
monitoring and alerting practices to help operators detect and respond to issues quickly, and
regular protocol updates and security patches to address emerging risks.

Together, these layers form a defense-in-depth approach to securing the network.

Network Phases

Shardeum’s network roadmap is structured into progressive phases, with each phase focusing on stability, adoption, and long-term scalability.

Phase 1 (Current)

The current phase focuses on operating a stable EVM-compatible mainnet with core protocol functionality. Key capabilities include:

full EVM smart contract support,
Proof-of-Stake consensus with validator delegation,
a decentralized validator network, and
low transaction fees with fast and deterministic finality.

Objective: Establish a strong user and developer base, with an initial focus on India as a primary market.

Phase 2 (Planned)

Future phases focus on expanding network capacity and supporting broader global adoption. Planned directions include:

throughput and performance optimizations,
additional scalability enhancements at the protocol level, and
ecosystem expansion beyond initial regional focus.

Objective: This phase is designed to evolve the network as usage grows, while preserving security, decentralization, and developer experience.

Note: Detailed specifications for validator operations and node lifecycle management are covered in dedicated validator documentation section. For protocol internals, refer to the Shardeum open-source codebase (Github Repository) shared below.