Kite, sometimes called Kite AI, is quietly shaping what could be one of the most important shifts in blockchain history: a world where autonomous AI agents are no longer just tools, but independent economic actors. Instead of building another general-purpose chain, Kite is positioning itself as the first Layer-1 blockchain designed from the ground up for the “agentic internet” — a future where AI agents can pay each other, coordinate tasks, negotiate services, and operate under programmable rules with real economic consequences.
At its core, Kite is an EVM-compatible Layer-1, which means it feels familiar to Ethereum developers while introducing something fundamentally new. The network is optimized for machine-to-machine commerce, focusing on high throughput, fast finality, and extremely low transaction costs. This matters because AI agents don’t behave like humans. They act continuously, at scale, and often in real time. Kite’s infrastructure is designed to support that constant flow of micro-transactions and intent-based interactions without choking on fees or latency.
One of Kite’s most distinctive features is its three-layer identity system, which separates human users, AI agents, and individual sessions. This design allows a person to create or control multiple agents, delegate permissions to them, and still retain oversight. Each agent can have its own cryptographic identity, reputation history, and audit trail through what Kite calls an Agent Passport. This means agents are not anonymous black boxes. Their behavior can be verified, constrained, and evaluated over time, which is critical if AI agents are going to be trusted with money, data access, or autonomous decision-making.
Governance and control are deeply embedded into the protocol. Instead of relying purely on social trust or off-chain rules, Kite allows spending limits, usage policies, and hierarchical permissions to be enforced directly at the protocol level. An agent can be authorized to perform certain actions, pay for services, or access APIs, but only within predefined boundaries. This creates a balance between autonomy and accountability that most blockchains simply weren’t designed to handle.
Payments are another area where Kite clearly differentiates itself. The network supports native stablecoin rails, including USDC, enabling near-instant settlement with minimal fees. For AI agents that need to pay for data feeds, APIs, compute resources, or digital services, this is a game changer. Transactions that would be impractical on traditional chains become routine when fees are measured in fractions of a cent and confirmations happen almost instantly. Over time, Kite envisions an agent app store where agents can discover, interact with, and pay other agents or services automatically, forming a self-sustaining machine economy.
The technical progress so far suggests this vision is more than just theory. Kite’s first testnet phase, known as Aero, reportedly processed hundreds of millions of agent interactions and tens of millions of transactions, involving millions of users and a surprisingly large number of unique AI agents. Those numbers indicate real experimentation and developer engagement rather than a dormant test environment. Alongside this, Kite has released developer tools, documentation, and smart contract frameworks that make it easier to build and deploy agent-native applications, including support for agent-to-agent intent messaging and verifiable communication standards.
From a funding perspective, Kite is well-backed for a project attempting something this ambitious. The team has raised around $33 million in total, including an $18 million Series A led by PayPal Ventures and General Catalyst, with participation from major strategic and crypto-native investors such as Samsung Next, SBI, Hashed, HashKey, and the Avalanche Foundation. This mix of traditional fintech and blockchain-focused backers reflects Kite’s positioning at the intersection of payments, AI, and decentralized infrastructure.
The KITE token sits at the center of the ecosystem, but its utility is being rolled out gradually. The initial phase focuses on ecosystem participation and incentives, encouraging developers, users, and agents to engage with the network. Later phases are expected to introduce staking, governance rights, transaction fee mechanics, and potential fee-burn models as mainnet activity ramps up. An airdrop eligibility process opened in late 2025, signaling the transition from testnet experimentation toward broader public participation.
On the market side, KITE has already made a notable entrance with listings on major exchanges such as Upbit, offering trading pairs against KRW, BTC, and USDT. This has significantly increased accessibility, particularly in Asian markets. Community discussions also mention other global exchanges, though users are generally advised to rely on official announcements when verifying listings.
Kite’s ecosystem ambitions extend beyond crypto-native use cases. Early integrations with platforms like Shopify and PayPal hint at a future where merchants can be discovered and paid by autonomous AI agents acting on behalf of users or other systems. Imagine agents that can autonomously source products, negotiate prices, and settle payments without manual intervention. That is the kind of real-world automation Kite appears to be targeting.
Under the hood, the network is experimenting with consensus and incentive mechanisms designed to align rewards with meaningful AI contributions, sometimes referred to as Proof of Attributed Intelligence. Combined with fast block times and a micro-cost transaction model, this approach aims to make Kite fundamentally more suitable for AI workloads than traditional Layer-1 blockchains that were designed around human behavior.
Looking ahead, Kite is still in an alpha-stage network environment, with public mainnet deployment expected as the ecosystem matures, potentially in early 2026 according to community signals. As usage grows, the transition to full token utility, on-chain governance, and staking will be key milestones to watch.
In summary, Kite is not trying to be another general-purpose blockchain competing on buzzwords alone. It is attempting to define a new category entirely: an AI-native economic layer where autonomous agents can safely, verifiably, and efficiently participate in real financial activity. If the agentic internet becomes as important as its proponents believe, Kite could end up being one of the foundational rails that make it possible.
