# Aztec vs NEAR

> NEAR Confidential Intents runs on a private shard with permissioned validators and a TEE-based bridge. Aztec combines client-side private execution with permissionless network participation.

Canonical: https://aztec.network/compare/near  
Type: Comparison  
Reviewed: 3 November 2026  
Publisher: Aztec Foundation

## Side by side

| | NEAR | Aztec |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Is the network unstoppable? | **Permissioned privacy shard.** The public NEAR chain is open proof of stake. Confidential Intents runs on a private shard with independent, permissioned validators. | **No one can stop it.** Permissionless sequencers and provers run the network. Upgrades follow public governance rules with a timelock. L2BEAT assesses the rollup at Stage 2. |
| Is there a privacy backdoor? | **Shard validators and a TEE.** Private execution happens inside the permissioned shard and reaches mainnet through a TEE-based bridge, so the shard's validators and the enclave are in the trust path. Deposits and withdrawals are public. | **No backdoor.** Private functions execute on the user's device and the network verifies a proof. There is no network-wide decryption key, no validator that re-executes private inputs, and no co-signer. Public calls and their inputs are visible by design. |
| Do they have private smart contracts? | **Intents, not contracts.** NEAR uses confidential transfers, swaps, and cross-chain intents. It is not general-purpose private contract execution. | **Private + public contracts.** Noir contracts combine private state and functions with public ones, and anyone can deploy them. Contracts compose on Aztec and reach Ethereum through L1/L2 messaging. |
| Who can build and participate? | **Permissionless to use.** Users can access Confidential Intents; operating a validator on its private shard requires permission. | **Permissionless to use, build, and operate.** Anyone can deploy contracts or participate as a sequencer or prover under the published protocol, staking, and hardware requirements. |
| Compliance approach | Not described in the documentation. The sources cover the shard and its bridge, not a disclosure or screening model for the service. | Selective disclosure at the application and user level. An application decides which facts it proves or publishes, and a user can share their own viewing keys with whoever they choose. No protocol-wide audit key, screening gate, or operator sits in the path of a transaction. |

## What NEAR does well

Confidential cross-chain swaps and transfers without client-side proof generation or a new wallet setup.

**The difference.** Compare the private service as well as the base chain: who operates it, how data crosses its bridge, and which disclosure rules an application can define. NEAR and Aztec do two fundamentally different things. In fact, NEAR could be utilized to confidentially bridge into Aztec.

## Sources

- [NEAR: Confidential Intents](https://www.near.org/blog/confidential-intents)
- [NEAR: Confidential Intents architecture](https://intents.near.org/confidential)
- [Aztec: private and public state](https://docs.aztec.network/developers/docs/foundational-topics/state_management)
- [Aztec: privacy considerations](https://docs.aztec.network/developers/docs/resources/considerations/privacy_considerations)
- [Aztec: governance voting](https://docs.aztec.network/participate/token/voting)
- [L2BEAT: Aztec Network](https://l2beat.com/scaling/projects/aztecnetwork)

---

Markdown representation of https://aztec.network/compare/near. Published by Aztec Foundation.