Canton Network vs. Ethereum: What's the Difference? Ethereum (@ethereum) is a general-purpose public blockchain where transactions and smart contract activity are broadly visible across the network. Validators use proof-of-stake to agree on the chain’s state. Canton Network (@CantonNetwork) takes a different approach, focusing on privacy, interoperability, and institutional financial workflows. Here are the key differences: (1) Privacy Ethereum is transparent by design. Addresses, balances, transactions, contract calls, and events can generally be inspected publicly. Ethereum is now researching additional privacy technologies, including private reads, private transactions, and zero-knowledge proofs. Canton uses sub-transaction-level privacy. Participants only receive the transaction data relevant to them, while sensitive information is shared on a need-to-know basis. (2) Network Structure Ethereum operates as a public blockchain with a shared global state maintained by its network of nodes and validators, plus layer 2 networks that settle back to it. Canton is designed as a network of networks. Applications can operate across different participant nodes and synchronizers while remaining interoperable, connected through the public Global Synchronizer run by super validators. (3) Consensus Ethereum’s proof-of-stake system uses validators to propose and attest to blocks, with validators staking ETH to participate in network security. Canton separates transaction validation from transaction ordering and confirmation. The participants involved in a transaction validate the relevant smart contract state, while synchronizers coordinate ordering and commits. (4) Smart Contracts Ethereum uses the Ethereum Virtual Machine, allowing developers to deploy programmable smart contracts across a broad public ecosystem. Canton uses Daml-based smart contracts and gives applications control over privacy, governance, permissions, and operating policies. This makes Canton particularly suited to workflows where different institutions need to interact without exposing every transaction to the entire network. (5) Main Use Cases Ethereum has developed into a broad platform for DeFi, NFTs, stablecoins, decentralized applications, and other permissionless applications. Canton is focused heavily on financial infrastructure, including tokenized assets, payments, institutional markets, and workflows requiring confidentiality. So, Ethereum emphasizes public verification and permissionless composability, while Canton emphasizes privacy-preserving interoperability between institutions on a public network.