Lowering the barrier for users to enter the Web3 world is the complete value and significance of AA, which has almost become an industry consensus.

AA, short for Account Abstraction, is translated as "账户抽象" in Chinese. For the purpose of understanding, this article temporarily compares "accounts" to bank accounts. However, the difference is that these accounts exist on the blockchain network, are decentralized, and have no borders. "Abstraction" in the Chinese context refers to the process of extracting the essential characteristics of things and discarding non-essential characteristics, commonly known as simplification.

If summarized in one sentence, AA is the underlying technology that enables a minimalist decentralized account system. The AA wallet, commonly referred to in the industry, serves as the entry point to this system. Its upper limit of functionality includes programmability and increased intelligence, while its lower limit is to reduce the basic threshold for users to enter the Web3 world. For example, it eliminates cumbersome operational processes such as managing mnemonic phrases and supporting gas fees for a single currency.

(Note: This is not a technical article, and for the sake of reader comprehension, there may be imprecise descriptions of terminology.)

Let AA Shine in Reality First

The concept of AA first appeared in EIP-2938 proposed by Ethereum core developers in September 2020. The following year in September, V God improved upon EIP-2938 and proposed EIP-4337, which suggested using smart contracts as wallet accounts and designing roles such as bundlers and paymasters, as well as a set of contract systems including entrypoints. In October 2022, V God updated EIP-4337, and shortly after, many projects at the Ethereum Developers Conference in Bogota began to innovate around the concept of AA.

Currently, in the exploration of the AA direction, there are projects such as Argent, Avocado, Unipass, and Obvious. In addition to basic functions such as keyless and gasless, each project has its own strengths. For example, Argent focuses on social recovery, while Unipass has made significant progress in the AA b2c direction. Comparatively, the recently launched OKX AA smart contract wallet is best known for its user experience.

On August 2nd, OKX announced the launch of its self-developed AA smart contract wallet. The wallet received official recognition from ERC4377 on the second day of its launch. ERC4377 tweeted that the design of OKX's AA smart contract wallet is very well thought out in terms of user experience. Some KOLs also expressed that OKX's development of the AA ecosystem will bring exponential growth to the market in the future.

Regarding this, Jason, the Chief Innovation Officer of OKX, responded that OKX has not fully utilized its advantages in user experience and there will be more plans in the future.

We have been paying attention to and conducting in-depth research on AA two years ago. During this period, we have accumulated a lot of technical knowledge. However, at that time, the AA ecosystem lacked industry standards and only had a rough direction. Early explorers could only explore slowly, so the development was slow. It was not until last year that the OKXWeb3 development team, together with the Ethereum community and the Ethereum Foundation, explored the EIP-4337 standard, and the direction of AA gradually became clear. The AA smart contract wallet manager said in an interview that OKX's AA wallet has already implemented some basic functions, and will continue to optimize the underlying capabilities of AA and carry out appropriate product innovation.

Currently, the wallet has implemented a complete set of 4337 contract systems in terms of technology, including roles such as bundler and paymaster, and supports 7 mainstream public chains (which is currently the most supported chain wallet on the market). Currently, users can create AA wallets on 7 popular public chains such as OKTC, Ethereum, and Arbitrum. After creating the wallet, users can use AA for one-click swap on dex, one-click investment on DeFi, and link and use other third-party Dapps on the discover page of Web3 wallet. It also supports users to directly pay Gas with stablecoins USDT/USDC.

The official launch of the Gas subsidy program has attracted many users to experience the creation of AA accounts and interact with them. Some KOLs have even released a series of tutorials.

According to official information, users can enjoy one gas fee reduction per day when transferring or trading, with a maximum reduction of 5U. Zakk revealed that the OKX AA smart contract wallet will also support social recovery and provide wallet mini-program components in the future, enabling friends and family to pay gas fees, multi-signature function chain follow-up, and high-level on-chain financial strategies that can be combined. These features are aimed at improving user engagement.

"Starting is always the hardest part. The OKX Web3 team has already brought AA into reality at the fastest speed possible. Next, they will lead the construction of the AA ecosystem and gradually promote its development and prosperity," said the spokesperson. Despite the fact that the development of the AA ecosystem is still in its very early stages, OKX is confident in rallying the industry to build a new generation of Web3 account system that benefits more users worldwide."

Building the AA ecosystem with the industry, creating a new generation of Web3 account system

Chain players who have experience in wallet development know that the existence of AA cannot be separated from EOA. EOA is the underlying architecture that supports the widely used Web3 account system. Under the EOA account system, users need to record private keys or mnemonic words. Once these two things are lost, all assets in their EOA accounts will be lost as well.

Additionally, there is the age-old issue of gas in the cryptocurrency industry. Users must hold the native token of the chain they are operating on as gas fees when executing any on-chain operations with an EOA account. While veteran players may be accustomed to this process, it presents a significant obstacle for new users entering the Web3 world. Understanding gas fees, obtaining gas fees, and the high cost of gas fees can become a roadblock for them as they explore this new world.

Of course, more importantly, EOA accounts do not have contract programmability. Except for transferring and receiving native tokens, all functions need to be implemented by calling contracts. And only one contract can be called at a time, which limits the space for some developers to innovate in product development.

Although AA has now solved some of the problems associated with EOA, there are still some challenges to creating a better Web3 account system, such as increased usage costs, low user demand, insufficient ecosystem support, and insufficient product innovation. Going forward, OKX will continue to innovate its products to encourage users to create AA accounts, while also maintaining deep connections with the Ethereum and other Web3 developer communities to guide industry-wide product innovation related to AA and to encourage project teams to optimize user experience and build the AA ecosystem.

"Product landing only counts for 50% of success. How to push more people to accept the AA standard? How to get more dapps to access/compatible with the AA standard? How to build the AA ecosystem together with the industry? These are the points we need to break through step by step," the person in charge said. The widespread adoption of AA will completely change the interaction mode of Web3, and the AA smart contract wallet will be open source in the near future. The OKXWeb3 team hopes to become an anchor in the Buider community, bringing everyone together to promote the construction of a new generation of Web3 account system.

Become an "Anchor" in the Builder Community

Since the beginning of 2023, the OKX Web3 team has been on a wild ride, launching the MPC wallet, actively promoting the construction of Bitcoin ecological infrastructure, and now becoming a leader in the AA track. It seems that the team has endless energy, which is partly due to their technical strength, but more importantly, their conviction for the future.

"OKX's mission has always been to solve user problems to the best of our ability. We are confident that Web3 will experience explosive growth, even though there are currently not many incremental users. We remain highly focused, just as NVIDIA began researching GPU parallel computing 10 years ago and did not miss out on the market dividends brought by Bitcoin and AI." The head of AA Smart Contract Wallet said that OKX's ultimate vision for Web3 is to create a WAAS (Wallet as a Service) for the AA ecosystem, and to work with the industry to build an account system for Web3 networks that is more suitable for internet users. "Make Web3 as easy to use as Web2."

If Bitcoin's ecological infrastructure is the first time that the outside world has labeled OKX Web3 development team as purely Builder, then the launch of the AA smart contract wallet has made OKX a major force in the new week's developer community. It must be acknowledged that the developer community and their spirit of construction have always been the underlying support for the development of Web3. With the addition of development teams with different backgrounds like OKX Web3, this underlying support has gradually become more diverse and open, releasing greater creativity and influence.

In the past, a senior technology expert once said that the more successful the Internet is, the harder it is for people to break through their understanding of Web3 based on blockchain. However, it seems that this curse will be broken in 2023, starting from the moment when OKX brought AA into reality.

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