What is Polaris?

Polaris is the latest product from Osmosis, aiming to solve the cross-chain fragmentation problem in crypto.

It is a user-centric DeFi application to trade ALL TOKENS on ALL CHAINS in ONE APP.

The concept of Polaris emerged during an Osmosis off-site, where the team brainstormed ways to elevate Osmosis and expand its user base.

Osmosis is really good at trading AppChain tokens like TIA, AKT, DYDX, ATOM or STATRS, assets that don't have their own spot DEX & are IBC enabled.

But what about ETH and SOL?

These two major assets along with other tokens living on these chains are all fragmented across DEXs on their according ecosystems. We can also call it The Great Chain Divide.

It's very hard and cumbersome for Osmosis to access tokens and liquidity outside of the IBC interoperability standard, that most Appchains utilize for interoperability.

Solving The Great Chain Divide

Osmosis's goal was always to be the Interchain DEX, whit the thesis in mind that ppl want to trade everything in one place. That's one major reason why CEXs are so successful.

Polaris will solve this fragmentation problem and make on-chain trading great again.

Moving up the stack

Rather than having all the liquidity sit in one venue, Osmosis plans on moving up the stack and built ONE App that taps into all the liquidity venues across the various chains.

A Token Portal abstracting everything away from the user. Instead of living in a siloed world with fragmented liquidity, Polaris will leverage and access the vast on-chain liquidity across all major DeFi ecosystems.

All tokens, All chains, One App.

Where does Osmosis fit in?

The goal with Polaris is to leverage unique features that can only be built on sovereign Appchains such as Osmosis, tailored to serve Defi users across Web3.

- 1-click trading
- Gas fee abstraction (users can pay gas in whatever token)
- Smart accounts and
- Privacy features that enable private trading

Portfolio Tracking

Polaris will provide users an aggregated view of all their balances across all chains.

And all that Polaris users need is one single wallet. Whatever wallet folks like to use, it works with Polaris. MPC (Multi Party Computation) does the rest.

Valardragon: "If we get this wallet custody management done right with MPC keys, we can achieve our dream of self-custody Private Internet Money with Polaris."

CEXs and Polaris

Polaris will also allow users to add CEX integrations into the user interface (UI).

For instance, users can add Coinbase API keys to Polaris to not only see their Solana, Ethereum and Cosmos balances but also tokens they hold on CEXs.

People will be able to track their entire crypto holdings in one single UI on Polaris.

But wait there is more, the team thought...

Since we've already imported API keys from CEXs and users can see their balances on Polaris, what about also routing trades through Binance or Coinbase? (more updates to be release in the near future)

For trades routing through CEXs, users will always maintaining self custody over their assets!

Roadmap for Polaris

The pilot version will launch supporting Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and the Cosmos ecosystem.

Integrations with TON, TRON, SUI, Hyperliquid and other chains with deep spot trading volume will be added over time.

When launch?

a) A first official product demo will be showcased at the Solana Breakpoint Conference on Sept. 20-21 in Singapore.

b) 1-2 weeks later, the team is aiming to launch the first pilot version for early access users.

c) The public version will go live after a few months of excessive pilot testing and feedback gathering.

For early pilot access sign up here: Polaris - The Token Portal

Will there be a Polaris token?

No! There are no plans for a Polaris token.

The objective for Polaris is to increase and bring more trading volume to Osmosis, capturing more cross-chain order flows.

Polaris will be paramount for making Osmosis the best venue for executing cross-chain swaps.

The Osmosis team has been working on Polaris for the past three months and features like:

- Alloyed assets
- Fast cross-chain bridging
- Fast block finality (faster than Solana)
- Deep Bitcoin Liquidity

will help to make Polaris the primary driver of volume into Osmosis.

Nick White, COO of Celestia, already had the honor of taking a look at the Polaris demo, and he was very impressed with account aggregation across all ecosystems and routing trades between multiple chains. All this while feeling like interacting with one integrated experience.

To sum it up:

Polaris is a user-centric DeFi application to trade ALL TOKENS on ALL CHAINS in ONE APP.

Instead of serving chains, Polaris will serve users!

Thanks for reading folks, we hope you've found this article helpful.

Disclaimer

This article is intended to educate readers about certain topics and should not be considered financial advice in any way.