Radix vs Ethereum

Consensus

Ethereum uses Casper PoS with a single execution layer processing all transactions sequentially. Scalability relies on L2 rollups (Optimism, Arbitrum, zkSync) which introduce sequencer centralization and cross-rollup composability challenges.

Radix uses Cerberus, which as specified parallelises consensus across shards so that throughput scales with shard count. As deployed on the live Babylon network, Cerberus runs unsharded — one shard group over the whole ledger, with the braiding machinery inactive — so today it too commits one ledger, and the linear-scaling property is a claim about the specification and about Hyperscale / Xi'an. The 500,000+ TPS test measured the Radix Foundation's Hyperscale implementation on a test network; it is not Cerberus and has never been a property of mainnet. For what each live network is actually doing, see Radix vs Solana.

Programming Model

Ethereum (Solidity): Account-based model where tokens are mappings inside contracts. Requires approve() + transferFrom() pattern. Susceptible to reentrancy, approval exploits, and front-running.

Radix (Scrypto): Asset-oriented model where tokens are native resources. No approval pattern. Reentrancy structurally impossible. Assets move in buckets.

Transactions

Ethereum: Opaque calldata – users blind sign hex data they can't read.

Radix: Transaction manifests – readable, composable, verifiable before signing.

Scalability

Property	Ethereum	Radix
L1 throughput, live	~15-30 TPS	One unsharded ledger (measured 21 August 2026)
Demonstrated in testing	—	500,000+ TPS, but on the Foundation's Hyperscale test network rather than Cerberus or mainnet
Scaling approach	L2 rollups (live)	L1 sharding (specified; in development as Xi'an)
Cross-shard composability	Async bridges	Atomic in the same transaction, as specified
Hardware requirements	Moderate (L1), centralized (L2 sequencers)	Commodity

Strengths of Each

Ethereum's strengths: Largest ecosystem, most liquidity, widest tooling support, strongest brand recognition, battle-tested over 10+ years.

Radix's strengths: Superior asset model (native assets, no approvals), readable transactions, a scaling design that adds shards rather than layers, developer-friendly Rust-based language, structurally eliminates common exploit classes.