Worldcoin Launches World Chain Developer Preview Ahead of Mainnet, Bypassing Testnet Phase

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Hassan Shittu

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Hassan Shittu

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July 9, 2024 15:07 EDT

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The Worldcoin Foundation, the organization behind the digital identity project OpenAI CEO Sam Altman co-founded, unveiled a developer preview for its upcoming World Chain blockchain. This step skips the conventional testnet phase, allowing developers immediate access to the building on a “gated mainnet” in anticipation of the full mainnet launch, which is expected later this year.

Worldcoin Unveils Developer Preview in Anticipation of the Full Mainnet Launch

The World Chain developer preview is now live ⚪️ pic.twitter.com/TEnfObrG2o

— Worldcoin (@worldcoin) July 9, 2024

The Worldcoin Foundation has announced the launch of the World Chain developer preview, marking a significant milestone in its mission to create a globally accessible digital identity ecosystem.

This preview, announced on July 9, provides developers worldwide with the tools to start building on World Chain, allowing them to deploy infrastructure and test applications on a gated mainnet, bypassing the traditional testnet phase.

Remco Bloemen, Head of Protocol at the Worldcoin Foundation, highlighted the benefits of this approach, stating,

“OP Stack has seen plenty of testing already—we know it works.”

Developers have been actively testing World Chain on the OP Stack, an open-source development framework maintained by the Optimism Collective. According to the Worldcoin Foundation, developers interested in participating can apply for access to the developer preview on Worldcoin’s official website.

Notably, the developer preview also marks the beginning of collaborations with numerous partners dedicated to providing tooling and infrastructure. Among these partners are Alchemy, Safe, and Elliptic, with more partnerships expected to be announced soon.

Built on the OP Stack and integrated with Worldcoin’s identity protocol, World ID, World Chain aims to facilitate real human transactions on a global scale.

This integration promises to enable scalable and cost-effective transactions, operating as a Layer 2 solution secured by Ethereum and supporting both the Ethereum and Optimism ecosystems.

World Chain Set to Scale Up Worldcoin

In under a year, Worldcoin user transactions have surged to account for nearly 50% of OP Mainnet’s activity, sometimes exceeding this during peak periods.To handle this unprecedented growth, World Chain will initially employ a standard EIP 1559 fee market with a block gas target of 10 million, double the current capacity of OP Mainnet.Also, to further enhance scalability, the Worldcoin Foundation is integrating Reth, a high-performance Ethereum execution client developed by Paradigm. Georgios Konstantopoulos, General Partner & CTO at Paradigm, expressed enthusiasm for this development:

“We are thrilled to help enable World Chain’s scaling roadmap with Reth. We look forward to working hand-in-hand with the Worldcoin Foundation and the rest of the community to achieve the ambitious mission of breaking through the 1GGas/s barrier and beyond.”

World Chain is said to be designed to prioritize human transactions, ensuring that those created by verified humans receive faster confirmation times. The chain aims to support various decentralized financial and identity applications focused on real-world utility. This includes stablecoins, payments, rewards, lending, and swapping functionalities.World Chain will launch as a Stage 1 rollup, incorporating fault proofs to enhance transaction security and integrity. This is intended to maintain the rollup’s decentralization and reliability.The World Chain developer preview is a significant step toward the mainnet launch, which is scheduled for later this year. This transition to the mainnet, aimed at enabling over 10 million people across 160 countries to explore and use on-chain applications through compatible wallets, will mark a new era of digital identity and financial accessibility.