Understanding ERC-7811: The Future of Wallet Asset Discovery in Multi-Chain Ecosystems

The blockchain ecosystem has evolved dramatically over the past few years, with users now managing assets across multiple networks, from Ethereum and Polygon to emerging Layer 2 solutions. However, one fundamental challenge has persisted: how can onchain applications accurately discover what assets a user truly owns?

Enter ERC-7811, an Ethereum standard that introduces the wallet_getAssets RPC method, revolutionizing how wallets communicate asset information to applications. This comprehensive guide explores what ERC-7811 means for the future of multi-chain wallet management and why it's particularly crucial for stablecoin ecosystems.

ERC-7811 introduces a new RPC call, wallet_getAssets, for wallets to declare to the app what assets are owned by the user. This allows for more accurate asset discovery and the use of assets that aren't available on-chain but can be provided by the wallet.

The standard addresses a critical limitation in today's blockchain landscape. Currently, onchain apps primarily rely on on-chain data to determine a user's balance, which can be limiting. Furthermore, an app might restrict the user from initiating actions that the wallet could otherwise resolve, as it cannot account for the total assets a user has across different accounts or chains.

Traditional asset discovery methods suffer from several limitations:

On-Chain Data Restrictions: On-chain transactions offer several benefits, they also come with certain limitations. Scalability Issues: The need for network-wide consensus can lead to slower transaction speeds and scalability challenges. Most onchain apps can only see assets that are explicitly visible on the specific blockchain they're querying, missing assets held across other networks or in different wallet configurations.

Cross-Chain Fragmentation: With the rise of multi-chain ecosystems, users frequently hold assets across multiple blockchains. A user might have USDC on Ethereum, Polygon, and Arbitrum, but an app on Ethereum can only detect the Ethereum-based holdings.

Hidden Asset Types: Some assets, particularly those in custody solutions or certain DeFi protocols, may not be immediately visible through standard on-chain queries, even though the wallet has access to them.

The ERC-7811 standard introduces a standardized JSON-RPC method that enables seamless communication between wallets and apps. Here's how the process works:

The core of ERC-7811 is the wallet_getAssets RPC call, which accepts several optional parameters to ensure efficient and targeted asset discovery:

Account Parameter: account is a REQUIRED field that indicates for which account assets are requested.

Asset Filtering: The standard supports granular filtering through assetFilter, assetTypeFilter, and chainFilter parameters. Consumers of wallet_getAssets SHOULD set assetFilter, assetTypeFilter and chainFilter with as granular as reasonably possible values. For example, if an app is only interested in interacting with a single token on a single chain, it should provide filters for this.

Performance Optimization: Doing this both ensures that wallets and the underlying infrastructure do not incur excessive cost, as well as significantly increased performance to client applications.

ERC-7811 defines several well-known asset types, including:

The rise of multi-chain ecosystems has created both opportunities and challenges for wallet developers and users. Multi-chain wallets let crypto holders seamlessly manage and interact with their assets across multiple blockchains from a single interface.

Meanwhile, the number of monthly mobile crypto wallet users hit an all-time high of 29 million in June 2024. This growth has been driven by several factors:

Enhanced User Experience: Multi-chain wallets eliminate the need for juggling multiple wallet applications by providing a unified platform for managing various digital assets.

Cross-Chain Compatibility: Multi-chain wallets offer significant benefits through their cross-compatibility with various blockchain networks.

DeFi Integration: Users of multi-chain wallets can also participate in decentralized applications across numerous blockchain networks.

ERC-7811 specifically addresses the challenges of multi-chain asset management by enabling wallets to communicate comprehensive asset information across networks. This is particularly valuable for:

Aggregated Balance Display: Instead of querying multiple chains individually, apps can get a complete picture of user assets through a single API call.

Cross-Chain Transaction Planning: Applications can better facilitate cross-chain transactions by understanding the full scope of available assets.

Enhanced DeFi Strategies: DeFi protocols can offer more sophisticated strategies when they have visibility into users' complete asset portfolios.

The stablecoin market has experienced explosive growth, with significant implications for wallet asset discovery. The stablecoin market cap reached $140 billion in early 2024, a modest 2% increase compared to the previous year.

Stablecoins represent nearly a third of daily crypto usage at 32%, second only to decentralized finance, or DeFi, at 34%, as measured by share of daily active addresses. This widespread adoption creates unique challenges for asset discovery:

Multi-Network Distribution: the share of Ethereum and Tron as stablecoin issuance networks declined from 90% to 83%, with Base, Solana, Arbitrum, and Aptos emerging as major competitors.

High Transaction Volume: The total volume of stablecoin transactions in 2024 reached $27.6 trillion, surpassing the combined transfer volume of Visa and Mastercard by 7.68%.

Cross-Border Payments: Approximately 30% of global remittances are now facilitated through stablecoins.

For stablecoin-focused applications and infrastructure providers, ERC-7811 offers several advantages:

Unified Stablecoin Management: Users can view and manage USDC, USDT, and other stablecoins across all supported networks through a single interface.

Enhanced Liquidity Discovery: Applications can identify the best sources of stablecoin liquidity across multiple chains, optimizing transaction routing and fees.

Compliance and Reporting: Regulatory compliance: 80% of stablecoins in circulation adhered to at least one form of regulatory compliance. Better asset visibility supports compliance efforts by providing complete transaction histories and asset holdings.

Implementing ERC-7811 requires understanding both the technical specifications and practical considerations for wallet and app integration.

Wallets implementing ERC-7811 must support several key requirements:

Asset Type Compliance: Implementations that are compliant with this ERC and return these well-known asset types MUST return at least these fields in metadata. Implementations MAY return more fields than specified here.

Chain ID Validation: chainFilter is an OPTIONAL field that specifies an array of chain ids, where each value in the array MUST be a valid EIP-155 chainId.

Capability Advertisement: If the wallet supports ERC-5792 wallet SHOULD respond on wallet_getCapabilities request using the assetDiscovery key.

For app developers, successful ERC-7811 integration requires careful consideration of user experience and performance:

Efficient Filtering: Always use the most specific filters possible to reduce computational overhead and improve response times.

Graceful Fallbacks: Implement fallback mechanisms for wallets that don't support ERC-7811, ensuring compatibility across the ecosystem.

User Privacy: Consider privacy implications when requesting asset information and only request necessary data.

Several types of applications can benefit significantly from ERC-7811 integration:

Portfolio Management: Comprehensive portfolio trackers can display accurate, real-time asset holdings across all supported networks.

DeFi Aggregators: Yield farming and lending platforms can optimize strategies based on complete asset visibility.

Cross-Chain Bridges: Bridge applications can better facilitate transfers by understanding available assets on both source and destination chains.

Payment Applications: Stablecoin payment systems can route transactions through the most cost-effective networks based on user holdings.

While ERC-7811 offers significant benefits, it also introduces important security and privacy considerations that developers must address.

Selective Disclosure: Wallets should implement granular permission systems, allowing users to control what asset information is shared with specific apps.

Data Minimization: if an app is only interested in interacting with a single token on a single chain, it should provide filters for this. Applications should only request the minimum asset information necessary for their functionality.

User Consent: Clear user interfaces should inform users about what asset information is being shared and why.

Wallet Authentication: Ensure proper wallet authentication before exposing asset information through the ERC-7811 interface.

Rate Limiting: Implement appropriate rate limiting to prevent abuse of the asset discovery endpoint.

Input Validation: Thoroughly validate all input parameters to prevent potential security vulnerabilities.

As with any emerging standard, ERC-7811 faces certain limitations that the community is actively working to address.

Adoption Timeline: As a draft standard proposed in November 2024, ERC-7811 requires widespread wallet and app adoption to reach its full potential.

Standardization: Since the type is a generic string, there could be a mismatch between the type app expects and the one returned by the wallet.

Performance Scaling: For wallets managing large numbers of assets across many networks, response times and computational requirements need careful optimization.

The ERC-7811 specification is designed to be extensible, with several potential future developments:

Asset Type Expansion: new asset types should be specified in future ERCs. The standard can evolve to support emerging asset types like liquid staking tokens, real-world assets, and other innovative financial instruments.

Privacy Improvements: Future versions may incorporate advanced privacy techniques like zero-knowledge proofs to enhance user privacy while maintaining functionality.

Performance Optimizations: As the standard matures, implementation optimizations will likely improve response times and reduce computational overhead.

The introduction of ERC-7811 comes at a time of significant growth in the blockchain ecosystem, particularly in areas directly relevant to asset discovery and management.

The cryptocurrency market has shown remarkable growth in several key areas:

Infrastructure Maturation: The 2024 State of Crypto report also reveals all-time highs in crypto activity. And it analyzes how blockchain infrastructure has matured — especially after recent scaling upgrades drastically decreased onchain transaction costs alongside the rise of Ethereum L2s and other high-throughput blockchains.

DeFi Expansion: Stablecoin usage in DeFi applications accounts for $56 billion, highlighting their utility in decentralized lending, borrowing, and trading.

Institutional Adoption: A 2024 Harvard Business Review study highlighted stablecoins as the preferred digital asset for institutional investors, with 60% adoption.

Different regions show varying adoption patterns that influence how ERC-7811 might be implemented:

Emerging Markets: Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa are the fastest growing regions for retail and professional-sized stablecoin transfers, with year-over-year (YoY) growth exceeding 40%.

Developed Markets: 88% of North American respondents viewing upcoming stablecoin regulations favorably.

Regulatory Clarity: This summer, the European Union (EU)'s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) went into effect for stablecoins.

To understand ERC-7811's significance, it's important to compare it with existing asset discovery methods and alternative approaches.

Traditional methods rely heavily on direct blockchain queries, which have significant limitations:

Data Availability: On-chain data come in many forms. These include wallet addresses, transaction amounts, NFT balances, token balances, code for smart contracts, etc. This information is publicly available and can be highly valuable.

Infrastructure Requirements: from a conventional perspective, it has been quite a cumbersome task to query this information.

Multi-Chain Complexity: Traditional approaches require separate queries to each blockchain, increasing complexity and latency.

Current API-based solutions offer some advantages but lack standardization:

Fragmented Ecosystem: Different wallets and services use proprietary APIs, creating integration challenges for app developers.

Limited Scope: Most APIs focus on specific networks or asset types, lacking the comprehensive approach of ERC-7811.

Reliability Concerns: Centralized APIs introduce single points of failure and may not always reflect real-time asset states.

ERC-7811 addresses many limitations of existing solutions:

Standardization: Provides a unified interface across different wallet implementations.

Comprehensive Coverage: Supports multiple asset types and blockchain networks through a single call.

Real-Time Accuracy: Enables wallets to provide the most up-to-date asset information, including off-chain holdings.

Successfully implementing ERC-7811 requires careful attention to both technical and user experience considerations.

Comprehensive Asset Support: Implement support for all major asset types and ensure accurate metadata provision.

Performance Optimization: Doing this both ensures that wallets and the underlying infrastructure do not incur excessive cost, as well as significantly increased performance to client applications. Cache frequently requested data and implement efficient filtering mechanisms.

User Control: Provide granular privacy controls, allowing users to selectively share asset information with different apps.

Regular Updates: Keep asset information current and implement real-time updates when possible.

Graceful Degradation: Design applications to work with varying levels of asset information availability.

Minimal Data Requests: Only request the specific asset information needed for your application's functionality.

User Education: Clearly explain why asset information is needed and how it will be used.

Security Measures: Implement proper authentication and authorization before requesting sensitive asset data.

Scalable Architecture: Design systems to handle high volumes of asset discovery requests efficiently.

Cross-Chain Support: Ensure infrastructure can aggregate asset information across multiple blockchain networks.

Compliance Tools: Provide features that help users and applications meet regulatory requirements.

Developer Resources: Offer comprehensive documentation, SDKs, and testing environments.

What makes ERC-7811 different from existing wallet APIs?

ERC-7811 provides a standardized approach that works across different wallet implementations, unlike proprietary APIs. It also supports comprehensive asset discovery across multiple chains and asset types through a single interface.

How does ERC-7811 protect user privacy?

The standard includes filtering mechanisms that allow users to control what information is shared. Wallets can implement granular permissions, and apps should only request necessary asset information.

What types of assets does ERC-7811 support?

The standard supports ERC-20 tokens, ERC-721 NFTs, native blockchain assets, and is extensible for future asset types. It also accommodates assets that may not be immediately visible on-chain.

How does ERC-7811 handle cross-chain assets?

ERC-7811 includes chain filtering capabilities and supports assets across multiple blockchain networks. Wallets can provide comprehensive asset information regardless of which chains the assets reside on.

What are the main benefits for stablecoin applications?

ERC-7811 enables stablecoin applications to discover user holdings across all supported networks, optimize liquidity routing, and provide better user experiences for cross-border payments and DeFi interactions.

How can developers start implementing ERC-7811?

Developers should review the official specification, implement the wallet_getAssets RPC method, ensure proper filtering and security measures, and test with compatible wallets and apps.

ERC-7811 represents a significant step forward in solving one of the blockchain ecosystem's most persistent challenges: comprehensive asset discovery across multi-chain environments. By providing a standardized interface for wallets to communicate complete asset information to apps, the standard enables more sophisticated user experiences and unlocks new possibilities for DeFi innovation.

Key Takeaways:

As the blockchain ecosystem continues to evolve toward a more interconnected, multi-chain future, standards like ERC-7811 will play a crucial role in creating seamless user experiences. For infrastructure providers, wallet developers, and apps creators, now is the time to begin exploring and implementing this powerful new standard.

The success of ERC-7811 will ultimately depend on widespread adoption across the ecosystem. By working together to implement and refine this standard, the blockchain community can create a more user-friendly and efficient multi-chain environment that unlocks the full potential of decentralized finance and Web3 applications.

Ready to integrate ERC-7811 into your wallet or onchain app? Start by reviewing the official specification and joining the community discussion on Ethereum Magicians to stay updated on implementation best practices and emerging use cases.