Aurora 

AURORA Price

What is the Aurora (AURORA) cryptocurrency?

Aurora is an Ethereum Virtual Machine execution environment deployed as a smart contract on NEAR Protocol, live since May 2021 and built by Aurora Labs under founder Alex Shevchenko. Developers deploy existing Solidity and Vyper dApps by changing the RPC endpoint, inheriting NEAR validators, ~2-second finality, and low fees paid in ETH. AURORA is the ERC-20 governance token of this network. AuroraDAO controls governance through on-chain voting, and the stack includes the Rainbow Bridge, a block explorer, and a price oracle.

Is Aurora an Ethereum layer 2 on NEAR Protocol?

Aurora functions like a Layer-2 but technically runs as an EVM smart contract on NEAR Protocol, not as a rollup settling to Ethereum. DropsTab classifies Aurora under Layer-2, DAO, and Near Ecosystem categories. Security comes from NEAR validators rather than Ethereum, and the Rainbow Bridge handles trustless token transfers between Ethereum, NEAR, and Aurora.

What is the AURORA governance token used for?

AURORA is primarily a governance token. Holders stake AURORA to receive vAURORA voting power in AuroraDAO, which governs the Aurora network and Rainbow Bridge infrastructure. AuroraDAO also approves AURORA-denominated ecosystem incentive programs. Transaction fees on Aurora are paid in ETH, so fee demand does not directly drive AURORA utility — governance and DAO-approved incentives are the token's core functions.

How do AURORA holders stake for vAURORA governance?

Holders stake AURORA tokens through AuroraDAO's on-chain governance interface and receive vAURORA in return. Voting weight in AuroraDAO is proportional to staked AURORA. Through vAURORA voting, holders govern network parameters and the bridge infrastructure connecting Aurora to Ethereum and NEAR. Staking for vAURORA is a governance mechanism, not a yield product — no fixed staking reward rate is guaranteed.

What is Aurora's maximum supply?

AURORA has a fixed maximum supply of 1,000,000,000 tokens. Total supply stood at 999,739,990 AURORA as of September 2026, per DropsTab data — effectively fully minted. No future emission exists beyond scheduled vesting releases. The token exists in three linked forms: the canonical ERC-20 on Ethereum, a NEAR-native bridge asset, and the Aurora Mainnet representation.

Why does AURORA's vesting schedule matter for investors?

Per DropsTab vesting data, the DAO Balance allocation — 48% of supply — is the only distribution still running, releasing roughly 3.6 million AURORA monthly since TGE on 19 November 2021. This continuous release at AuroraDAO's discretion creates a persistent monthly overhang on float. Investor buckets are fully released: the Community Treasury unlocked its full 200 million tokens at TGE, and Private Round vesting ended in late 2024. No cliff-expiry events remain.

Who are Aurora's investors?

DropsTab fundraising data shows Aurora raised $12 million in a Private Round on 14 October 2021, selling 90 million AURORA — 9% of supply — at about $0.1333 per token at a $130 million pre-valuation. Pantera Capital and Electric Capital rank as Tier 1 backers, with Dragonfly Capital and IOSG Ventures at Tier 2. Aurora's own blog confirms 100+ total investors split between VC and ecosystem buckets.

How much funding has Aurora raised in total?

Total disclosed fundraising is approximately $17.77 million: the $12 million Private Round plus four community IDOs in November 2021 — SmartPad, Boca Chica, Skyward, and Gate.io Startup. No single backer holds more than the shared 9% private-round bucket, which keeps investor concentration low. Proceeds were earmarked for EVM maintenance, bridges, and engineering.

On which exchanges can AURORA be traded?

AURORA trades spot on 10+ centralized exchanges and multiple decentralized venues, per DropsTab data. The deepest established CEX venues are Bybit, KuCoin, Gate, and HTX, mostly in AURORA/USDT pairs; Crypto.com Exchange lists AURORA/USD. On the DEX side, Uniswap V2 on Ethereum hosts the AURORA/WETH pair for the canonical ERC-20. No derivatives markets are tracked. No Binance or Coinbase spot listing exists, which limits liquidity depth.

Is Aurora the same as Auroracoin?

No. Auroracoin is an unrelated cryptocurrency launched in 2014 for the Icelandic market. Aurora is an EVM execution environment on NEAR Protocol whose AURORA token launched at TGE on 19 November 2021. The two projects share only a similar name — different chains, different technology, different teams.