DeFiCircle has launched Nanopayments on testnet, offering a new infrastructure layer for gas-free USDC microtransactions. According to NS3.AI, this development comes as the stablecoin market capitalization has exceeded $314 billion. The Nanopayments system aggregates payments off-chain and settles them on-chain in batches, with Circle covering the gas fees at the batch layer. Initially, it supports Arbitrum, Base, Ethereum, Optimism, Polygon, and Sonic networks.
Nanopayments is designed to cater to AI agents and other autonomous software requiring rapid, sub-cent payments for services such as pay-per-call APIs, usage-based billing, and machine-to-machine marketplaces. This innovation aims to streamline transactions and reduce costs for users engaging in frequent microtransactions.