Overview
NuNet is a computing network that lets people share spare hardware and lets others use that hardware to run software, including AI workloads. Owners of anything from a laptop to a server full of graphics processors (GPUs, the chips most AI work runs on) connect their machines, and NuNet matches each job to a suitable machine automatically1. It works a bit like a ride-hailing app for computing power: a job describes what it needs, and the network finds a machine that fits.
NuNet began inside SingularityNET, a decentralized AI network, in 2018 and launched its live network on March 2, 20262. People running jobs pay in NTX, NuNet's token, and providers receive it for completed work1. NuNet's protocol settles those payments on Cardano3. The project belongs to DePIN, short for decentralized physical infrastructure networks, where many independent owners pool real-world hardware instead of one company owning the hardware.
Key Features
- Put idle hardware to work. The NuNet Appliance, a ready-made Ubuntu Linux package with a web dashboard, registers a machine on the network and makes its spare capacity available to others4.
- Jobs find the right machine on their own. NuNet's matching layer picks hardware based on location, response time, chip type, and cost, so users don't browse a marketplace or pick servers by hand1.
- Small and large machines share one network. The same software layer runs on a Raspberry Pi, a single GPU rig, or a 64-GPU data center rack3.
- Signed contracts and self-owned digital IDs. NuNet's design treats no participant as trusted by default. Each party signs its contracts, and identity rests on decentralized identifiers (DIDs), digital IDs that no single company controls3.
- Public code under a non-profit steward. The core Device Management Service, the software each machine runs to join the network, is published on GitLab under the Apache 2.0 license5, which lets anyone copy, modify, and share the code free of charge. The non-profit NuNet Foundation stewards the protocol through a council of three to six members6.
What to Expect
Hardware owners start by installing the NuNet Appliance, which bundles NuNet's software and a web dashboard in one package. The dashboard lets you join an organization, a group of participants that share rules, roles, and permissions, which anyone can create7. From there you sign contracts and receive NTX from the people using your machine4. People who need computing power launch jobs from an orchestrator, the device that defines what to run, and NuNet handles the matching7.
Businesses that want hands-on help can work with NuNet Solutions, the commercial arm, which offers managed orchestration and protocol integration. Its listed deployments include smart-building energy agents and spatial computing for robotics and augmented reality with Auki Labs, both run as validated proofs of concept8. Auki's partnership announcement says NuNet will help deploy relay servers for The Posemesh, Auki's spatial computing network, as close to demand as possible, which keeps delays low for real-time applications9.
Cardano's community funding program, Project Catalyst, has funded NuNet projects that are now complete. One let stake pool operators, the people who run Cardano's block-producing servers, run workloads on community-provided hardware10. Another connected GPU providers so Cardano projects could get machine learning computing power11. Developers will find setup guides and technical references in the NuNet documentation.
