NEAR Protocol is set to roll out dynamic resharding in June, a major upgrade that will allow the blockchain to automatically expand its capacity by adding shards as demand increases, without requiring human coordination.
The Layer-1 network’s upcoming update is designed to make scaling fully autonomous, marking a key step in its long-term goal of building a highly scalable blockchain infrastructure. Market participants have responded positively, pushing the NEAR token sharply higher. NEAR has surged more than 27% over the past 24 hours, trading around $2.25.
Announcing the upgrade on X, the protocol said: “Dynamic resharding is coming to NEAR. The upcoming network upgrade will enable the protocol to add shards automatically as demand grows,” adding that it advances its vision of “building the world’s most scalable blockchain protocol at the highest level of performance.”
Shards are smaller, independent segments of a blockchain that process transactions and smart contracts in parallel. The concept is often compared to multiple checkout lines in a supermarket, allowing more users to be served simultaneously and improving throughput during periods of high demand.
Until now, however, increasing the number of shards on NEAR has been a slow and manual process, requiring validator coordination, governance votes, and staged network upgrades that could take weeks to complete.
With dynamic resharding, that process becomes automatic. When a shard becomes overloaded, the system will detect the increased demand and split it deterministically, redistributing workload across additional validators without requiring manual intervention.
According to NEAR, “Adding shards has required a full protocol upgrade: weeks of validator coordination, a vote, a staged rollout. Dynamic resharding makes it automatic: a shard hits a state size threshold, splits deterministically, and is validated by state witnesses with no human intervention.”
The upgrade is seen as particularly important for supporting an emerging AI-driven on-chain economy, where autonomous agents and bots may increasingly conduct transactions at scale.
Alongside scalability improvements, NEAR is also introducing post-quantum-safe signing as part of the upgrade. The move is aimed at preparing the network for potential future threats from quantum computing, which some researchers warn could eventually weaken or break current cryptographic standards.
The concern stems from ongoing academic and industry discussions, including warnings that sufficiently advanced quantum machines could one day compromise existing blockchain security systems.
By adding quantum-resistant cryptography, NEAR aims to strengthen long-term security and protect user funds against future computational risks.
NEAR’s native token has been the strongest performer among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization over the past 24 hours, driven by the rally. In contrast, Bitcoin BTC $75,547.11 slipped 0.4% to around $77,360 over the same period.
Additional momentum has also been supported by demand for the Bitwise NEAR Staking ETP in Europe. According to Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley, the product attracted around $7 million in inflows this week, reflecting growing institutional interest in NEAR exposure.
