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The simplest way to think about this system is:
  • Ethereum execution, but blocks are Bitcoin blocks.
Smart contracts run in an EVM and follow familiar Ethereum semantics. The difference is how transactions enter the system and how execution is paid for.

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Blocks

Instead of Ethereum blocks, Bitcoin blocks define ordering. Operations are processed in the order their inscriptions appear on Bitcoin. There is no separate block production, proposer role, or mempool for the EVM layer. If a Bitcoin transaction is reordered or reorged, the corresponding EVM execution is replayed accordingly.

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Transactions

There is no EVM mempool. What would normally be an Ethereum transaction is represented as an Ordinals inscription. Deployments, contract calls, and signed EVM transactions are all submitted as inscription data and activated by sending them to the module address. From a contract’s perspective, execution is identical to a normal EVM call. From a user’s perspective, interaction happens entirely through Bitcoin transactions.

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Gas

There is no gas token and no dynamic gas price. Execution limits are derived from inscription size:
  • Each inscribed byte grants a fixed amount of gas
  • Larger inscriptions allow more computation
  • Gas is prepaid by paying higher Bitcoin fees for larger transactions
This means:
  • You never reason about gas markets or base fees
  • There is no priority fee or bidding mechanism
  • The cost of computation is directly tied to Bitcoin’s fee market

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What Feels the Same as Ethereum

  • Solidity smart contracts
  • EVM execution semantics
  • Contract storage and state persistence
  • ABI encoding and calldata
  • Events and logs
  • ERC-style token logic
Most existing Solidity code works unchanged, provided it does not rely on Ethereum-specific assumptions.

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What Is Different

  • Accounts do not have private keys; identity is derived from Bitcoin scripts
  • ecrecover is not usable for authentication, and BIP-322 can be used instead
  • There is no notion of gas price or gas refunds
  • Transactions are not instantaneous and follow Bitcoin block times
  • Execution is triggered by inscriptions, not by an EVM mempool
If you treat Bitcoin as the settlement and ordering layer, and the EVM as a deterministic execution module layered on top, the system behaves predictably and avoids the trust tradeoffs common in rollups and Layer 2 designs.