What is Sui
As a next-generation Layer 1, Sui isn’t just a faster, cheaper blockchain, it’s a new coordination and computation layer reimagining how apps are built and experienced. From its core architecture to native tools, Sui integrates everything needed to make Web3 feel natural and intuitive for both everyday users and developers.
Unlike most blockchains that simply replicate existing models, inheriting technical burdens, Sui introduces a completely new architecture optimized for usability, performance, and seamless coordination across Web3.
An architecture built around objects and people
Sui takes a fundamentally different approach from traditional blockchain models, treating assets, accounts, and contracts as distinct objects rather than entries in a global ledger. This object-oriented architecture introduces two major benefits.
For users, it aligns with how we already think. A token, a sword, a profile, they’re all discrete things that we can see, own, and interact with. Ownership on Sui is explicit: you don’t just have a balance of tokens noted in a smart contract, you own objects with traceable histories, permissions, and logic attached.
For developers, objects make apps easier to reason about and safer to build. Code can be structured around assets that behave consistently, follow clear rules, and can evolve over time, perfect for use cases like gaming, social media, finance, and other interactive content.
To support this model, Sui uses a custom version of Move, a secure smart contract language originally developed by Sui co-founder Sam Blackshear while working at Meta. Move on Sui is designed to work in harmony with the object model, offering a level of clarity and safety that’s nearly impossible to achieve with other smart contract platforms.
Performance, no matter what
Sui’s object-oriented architecture doesn’t just make development easier, it unlocks powerful performance benefits for everyone.
Because Sui treats assets and accounts as distinct objects with clear ownership, many transactions can be processed in parallel, so long as they don’t touch the same objects. This makes it possible for the network to execute thousands of unrelated transactions simultaneously, without waiting in line. It’s one of the key reasons Sui remains smooth and responsive even during traffic spikes. Where other networks slow down or stall under pressure, Sui keeps moving.
Its consensus mechanism, Mysticeti, further accelerates things by reducing latency for shared data. With Mysticeti, Sui achieves sub-second finality, making it the fastest major blockchain in production.
Even with this speed, Sui maintains stable and low gas fees, thanks to its advanced execution model. Whether the network is quiet or experiencing peak demand, fees remain predictable and affordable. This is not just theoretical, it has been proven in natural transaction spikes.
A better experience, without Web3 headaches
For most people, blockchain apps come with unfamiliar hurdles: intimidating wallets, absurd gas fees, and weird addresses. Sui eliminates these pain points through a tightly integrated suite of native features that make onboarding seamless.
Imagine this:
You discover an app built on Sui without having ever used Sui before. Instead of being confronted with a seed phrase that you need to secure with your life, you have the option to simply log in using your Google account. That’s it, you’re in. Your wallet is created on the fly, and it’s yours alone: fully self-custodied and recoverable, thanks to zkLogin.
When it’s time to interact with the app—claim an NFT, make a swap, start a game—there’s no need to worry about gas. The app has chosen to cover new users' transaction fees using sponsored transactions, so you can just click and go.
Instead of copying and pasting long wallet addresses, you acquire a SuiNS name, like @user123, making it easy to manage your accounts and share your name with friends.
Every piece of that flow is native to the network, working together without plugins or add-ons. Onboarding to Sui is more similar to a traditional web app than anything in Web3.
Composable infrastructure for high-performance DeFi
Sui’s architecture and developer toolkit aren’t just optimized for user experience, they’re engineered for deep composability across apps, making it an ideal foundation for a new generation of apps, including Decentralized Finance (DeFi).
At the center of Sui’s DeFi ecosystem is DeepBook, Sui’s native, onchain order book and liquidity layer. DeepBook isn’t an app—it’s an open, shared infrastructure that any app can tap into for liquidity. Whether you’re building a trading app, a lending protocol, or a game, DeepBook provides composable liquidity without requiring developers to reinvent the wheel.
This kind of shared infrastructure makes Sui’s DeFi ecosystem more efficient, more transparent, and more flexible. And because DeepBook is built directly into Sui, it benefits from the same performance advantages that power the rest of the network.
Sui’s DeFi composability also extends to Bitcoin-based assets. As one of the leading chains advancing BTCfi, Sui has become a hub for trust-minimized Bitcoin integrations. From native support for assets like xBTC to verifiable offchain computation via Nautilus, the Sui ecosystem enables Bitcoin holders to put their capital to work, without compromising the properties the Bitcoiners hold most dear.
Sui, the coordination layer for Web3
When you combine Sui’s object-oriented architecture, fast finality, seamless onboarding, robust DeFi infrastructure, and deeply integrated composability, you don’t just get another blockchain. You get a platform purpose-built to coordinate people, assets, and logic across decentralized applications, efficiently, securely, and at scale.
Sui isn’t just where you build apps, it’s where apps, users, and protocols connect in ways that are fast, secure, and intuitive. It’s where composability finally lives up to its promise. And it’s where Web3 becomes a seamless experience that anyone can access and trust.
How to get SUI
If you want to start using Sui on-chain, it’s important that you first download a Sui-compatible Wallet. OKX Wallet gives you access to Sui and more than 130 other chains, making it the most convenient wallet to use. Adding on the OKX DEX, Earn products and rewards campaigns, OKX Wallet is the most powerful tool you need to do everything on-chain on Sui.
Now that you’ve got your wallet, you need to top it up with SUI to be able to do anything on-chain, as all transaction fees (gas fees) are paid in SUI.
There are two ways to do this, and it depends on your preference.
To get started, you will first need to set up a Sui Wallet. Download OKX Wallet here.