An Introduction to Namada Addresses

All accounts in Namada have a unique address, exactly one Validity Predicate and optionally any additional data in its dynamic storage sub-space.

There are currently 3 types of account addresses:

• Implicit: An implicit account is the simplest account type. It is derived from a keypair and can be used to authorize certain transactions such as sending and staking tokens, or paying fees. Implicit accounts have no code attached to them, and can only have one key controlling it. This differs it from established accounts, which can support multiple keys.
• Established: Unlike implicit accounts, which exist as soon as the keypair is generated, an established account must be initialized with an on-chain transaction. It is associated with one or more cryptographic keys. An established account has the vp_user validity predicate which validates any associated transaction to ensure that the multisignature threshold is correctly met.
• Internal: These are special internal accounts, such as those for the protocol parameters, proof of stake and IBC modules.

Managing keypairs

Namada uses ed25519 (opens in a new tab) keypairs for signing cryptographic operations on the blockchain.

The namadaw binary is used for key management. Various sub-commands are available under:

namadaw --help

See also: File system wallet for examples and additional info on using namadaw to manage your keys.