Walrus is a decentralized, on-chain programmable storage protocol developed by Mysten Labs. It allows storage, retrieval, and execution of logic over large off-chain data (e.g., files, media) while maintaining verifiability and composability with Sui smart contracts.

Walrus uses a decentralized storage network with erasure coding and replication across validator-run storage nodes. Integrity is enforced via cryptographic commitments (e.g., Merkle roots) posted on-chain. Clients verify proofs before accepting data as valid.

 WAL is a utility token used for:

• Payment for storage and retrieval
  
  
• Staking to storage providers (Delegated PoS)
  
• Governance over protocol parameters and upgrades

WAL token economics aim to stabilize storage pricing via fiat-pegged payment logic despite market volatility.

Walrus integrates with Sui’s Move VM. Stored data objects are referenced and interacted with directly from Move smart contracts. This enables use cases like storage leasing, access control, and dynamic data marketplaces.

Write latency depends on data chunking, replication, and finalization on Sui. Reads are off-chain, with on-chain proofs for verification. The model is optimized for infrequent writes and high-volume reads, especially for static content.