Ontology is a network designed to be operated across multiple blockchains. Its main focus revolves around trust issues, and it provides identity verification and reputation management capabilities. Ontology's goal is to be a platform for decentralized trust systems in businesses. Their distributed network is set up to facilitate cooperation between different projects in a trust ecosystem. Ontology's framework allows users to customize different public blockchains for different applications. Ontology has a two-token structure. ONT is the utility token of the network that can be used to generate Ontology Gas (ONG). Ontology has an innovative consensus mechanism called Verifiable Byzantine Fault Tolerance (VBFT). It combines elements of Proof-of-Stake (PoS), VRF (Verifiable Number Function), and Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT). The VBFT consensus mechanism will select nodes that meet certain conditions, and will verify transactions.

AION calls itself a 3rd generation blockchain network, and is primarily focused on connecting blockchain networks. AOIN aims to solve the interoperability issues facing the various blockchains, and be the connecting bridge between them. AION's cross-chain platform has different consensus mechanisms for interchain and on-chain transactions. The on-chain consensus mechanism combines BFT (Byzantine Fault Tolerance), dPoS (Delegated Proof-of-Stake) and a new neural network inspired verification algorithm known as Proof-of-Intelligence.
Interchain transactions are managed by bridges. The bridges has a consensus mechanism that is different from the main AION chain, and each bridge is secured by an individual consensus. The bridge validators will be rewarded by interchain transaction fees.