Walrus integrates with the Sui blockchain by cleanly separating control from data, using Sui as the coordination and settlement layer while keeping heavy storage off-chain. This lets Walrus deliver large-scale, low-cost blob storage without congesting the base chain.
Here’s how the integration works in practice.
1. Sui as the Control Plane
Sui acts as Walrus’s control plane, handling everything that needs strong consistency, composability, and economic enforcement.
On Sui, Move smart contracts manage:
WAL payments for storage contracts
Staking and delegation of WAL to storage nodes
Committee selection for active storage operators
Reward streaming per epoch
Subsidies, commissions, and slashing logi
Verification and final settlement of storage proofs
Because Sui uses an object-centric model, each stored blob is represented as a programmable on-chain object. That object tracks metadata such as size, duration, commitments, and payment status, making storage composable with other on-chain systems.
2. Off-Chain Data Plane for Storage
The actual data never lives on Sui.
When a user stores data:
The blob is erasure-coded using Red Stuff encoding
It is split into small slivers (around 1 MB each)
Slivers are distributed across storage nodes in the active committee
Data is replicated roughly five times to tolerate failures
The system can lose up to about 20 percent of nodes without data loss
This keeps Sui lightweight while Walrus nodes handle storage, bandwidth, and retrieval off-chain.
3. Storage Workflow on Sui
The lifecycle of a blob starts with a Sui transaction.
1. The user submits a Sui transaction that:
Registers the blob commitment (Merkle root)
Specifies size and storage duration
Pays the full storage cost upfront in WAL
2. Sui creates a blob object that represents the storage contract.
3. Storage nodes attest that they have received and stored their assigned slivers.
4. These attestations are aggregated into a Proof of Availability certificate.
5. The certificate is submitted back to Sui, where it is verified and finalized on-chain.
From that point on, Sui tracks payments and streams rewards to nodes and stakers over time.
4. Economic Coordination via Move Contracts
Sui’s Move contracts enforce Walrus’s economics deterministically.
WAL is locked and streamed to operators epoch by epoch
Rewards scale with stake, uptime, and data served
Nodes with more delegated WAL receive more data assignments
Underperforming nodes face slashing, with part of the stake burned
Subsidies from the community pool can top up rewards early on
SUI is used only for gas, while WAL handles storage payments and security incentives.
5. Security and Committee Model
Sui coordinates committee elections using delegated proof of stake.
WAL holders delegate to storage operators
Higher stake increases a node’s chance of selection and data load
Committees rotate, reducing long-term centralization risk
Randomized challenges check availability without pulling data on-chain
This ties storage reliability directly to economic skin in the game.
6. Why Sui Fits Walrus
Walrus benefits directly from Sui’s design choices:
Parallel execution allows fast blob registration and settlement
Object model makes storage programmable and composable
High throughput supports large-scale data coordination
Low fees keep control-plane costs minimal
Walrus effectively becomes Sui’s native blob and data availability layer, optimized for AI datasets, rollups, ZK applications, NFTs, and any dApp that needs verifiable off-chain data.
7. Cross-Chain, but Sui-Native
Walrus can integrate with other chains like Solana or Ethereum via bridges and tooling, but Sui remains the canonical settlement layer. All core economics, proofs, and governance resolve on Sui.
Bottom Line
Walrus integrates with Sui by:
Using Sui for economic logic, verification, and governance
Keeping large data off-chain for scalability
Turning storage into programmable on-chain objects
Aligning incentives through Move-enforced staking and rewards
This architecture lets Walrus deliver fast, cheap, and verifiable storage while staying deeply composable within the Sui ecosystem.
