Smart Contracts on Polkadot Hub¶
Introduction¶
Polkadot Hub provides a production-ready smart contract platform that combines Ethereum compatibility with the performance and cross-chain capabilities of the Polkadot ecosystem. Developers can deploy smart contracts directly on Polkadot Hub while using familiar Ethereum tooling, workflows, and programming languages.
Built with a dual-VM approach, Polkadot Hub offers two execution backends: REVM for unmodified EVM compatibility and native PVM for optimized computationally expensive workloads. This dual-VM architecture enables developers to migrate existing Ethereum contracts instantly or optimize for speed and efficiency with native execution.
Why Build on Polkadot Hub¶
Ethereum Compatibility¶
Deploy existing Ethereum contracts with zero modifications while maintaining full compatibility with your existing development stack:
- Complete JSON-RPC API support: Use MetaMask, Hardhat, Remix, Foundry, and all standard Ethereum tooling.
- Standard libraries: Integrate Ethers.js, Web3.js, Viem, Wagmi, and Web3.py without changes.
- Solidity development: Write contracts in Solidity or migrate existing code directly.
- Familiar workflows: Maintain your existing deployment, testing, and monitoring processes.
Performance Options¶
Choose between two execution backends:
- REVM: Run unmodified Ethereum contracts with full EVM/Ethereum compatibility.
- PVM: Compile to optimized RISC-V bytecode for enhanced performance and lower fees while keeping Ethereum-compatibility.
Both backends share the same RPC interface and tooling support, allowing seamless transitions. In addition, smart contracts can interact with Polkadot native services via precompile contracts.
Cross-VM & Cross-Chain Capabilities¶
Smart contracts written for one VM (for example, EVM) can interact directly with other smart contracts written for the RISC-V PVM, and back. This allows to use full EVM compatible contracts but extend to heavy/complex execution workloads to the PVM RISC-V backend.
Furthermore, all smart contracts in Polkadot Hub can interact with any service in the Polkadot ecosystem through XCM, enabling token transfers, remote execution, and cross-chain composability without bridges or intermediaries.
Other Smart Contract Environments¶
Beyond Polkadot Hub's native PVM support, the ecosystem offers two main alternatives for smart contract development:
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EVM-compatible parachains: Provide access to Ethereum's extensive developer ecosystem, smart contract portability, and established tooling like Hardhat, Remix, Foundry, and OpenZeppelin. The main options include Moonbeam (the first full Ethereum-compatible parachain serving as an interoperability hub), Astar (featuring dual VM support for both EVM and WebAssembly contracts), and Acala (DeFi-focused with enhanced Acala EVM+ offering advanced DeFi primitives).
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Rust (ink!): ink! is a Rust-based framework that can compile to PVM. It uses
#[ink(...)]attribute macros to create Polkadot SDK-compatible PVM bytecode, offering strong memory safety from Rust, an advanced type system, high-performance PVM execution, and platform independence with sandboxed security.
Next Steps¶
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Guide Get Started
Quick-start guides for connecting, deploying, and building your first smart contract.
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Guide Cookbook
Step-by-step tutorials for deploying contracts, tokens, NFTs, and full dApps.
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Guide Ethereum Developers
Understand key differences in accounts, fees, gas model, and deployment on Polkadot Hub.
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Guide Precompiles
Discover advanced functionalities including XCM for cross-chain interactions.
| Created: January 14, 2026