Guide · checked against its sources on 2026-10-24
Namada's shielded pool is one pool where assets from Namada and other chains are held and moved privately: a zero-knowledge circuit that extends the Sapling circuit of Zcash to many assets, which protects everyone in it more as more transactions use it.[1][2][3]
Shielded rewards pay newly minted NAM to people who keep eligible assets in the pool, without locking them; governance decides which assets are eligible and how much each pays.[4][5][6]
Inside the pool, an observer cannot see who sent a transfer, who received it, which asset it was or how much was sent; Namada's posts describe shielded transactions as indistinguishable from one another, though a transaction's fee and the account that pays it are public.[7][8][9]
The pool's own balance of each asset is transparent, as in Zcash: from outside, the pool is an account holding assets. That is how this site can show how much NAM it holds. Assets that leave the pool are public again.[9][8]
Moving in and out can still reveal things: Namada's docs warn that transfers into and out of Namada can expose personal information, and advise bringing funds in from a different public address than the one used for your other public transactions.[3]
Shielding moves assets from a transparent address, starting with tnam, to a shielded payment address, starting with znam; assets can also arrive in the pool straight from another chain.[10][6]
A shielded transfer moves assets from one shielded address to another, and unshielding moves them back to a transparent address; both need the spending key of the shielded account.[11][12]
In Namadillo, Shield Assets takes assets from your transparent Namada balance or from another chain, and Unshield sends them to your transparent balance or straight to another chain.[6][13]
A wallet needs its own copy of the pool's notes to know what it holds, so it keeps in step with the chain, which Namada's docs call shielded sync and recommend doing through an indexer.[14]
A spending key, starting with zsknam, authorizes spending from a shielded account and must be kept private; a viewing key, starting with zvknam, shows the account's incoming and outgoing balances but cannot spend them.[15][16]
A payment address, starting with znam, is what you share to receive. Many payment addresses can be made from the same spending key, and Namada's docs recommend making several.[15][16]
Viewing keys are how you choose what to reveal: you can let a specific party see an account's transaction history without giving them the power to spend.[8][15]
Namada pays shielded rewards in NAM to everyone keeping eligible assets in the pool, and the assets do not need to be locked; governance adds assets to the eligible list or removes them, and sets each asset's reward settings.[4][5][6]
Each asset's rate comes from a controller that aims at a target amount of that asset in the pool, so the rate is highest when little of the asset is shielded. The rewards are newly minted NAM, held in a shielded rewards pool until they are paid.[5][6]
Namadillo's docs describe rewards arriving every day, and namada.net says they are added to your shielded account automatically; the amounts Namadillo shows in advance are estimates.[6][17]
Rewards compound while the assets stay shielded. They are claimed through the convert circuit, which happens when assets are converted to the current period, as they must be before they leave the pool.[5]
When a transaction spends from the shielded pool, as a shielded transfer or an unshielding does, its fee can be paid from the shielded balance, which Namada's docs call good practice for privacy; unless a gas payer is named, the command-line client unshields the fee to a disposable address and pays it from there.[18]
Paying the fee of a transparent transaction from the shielded pool is possible but discouraged, because it could link the two.[18]
Yes. The pool's balance of each asset is transparent, though who owns what inside it is not. This site shows the NAM in the pool with its source and time.[9][7]
No. Assets do not need to be locked: rewards accrue while eligible assets stay in the shielded pool.[5][4]
Governance decides, so the list is read from the chain, not from a document: Namada's docs show the command that lists the eligible assets, and Namadillo shows no estimated reward for an asset that is not eligible.[4][6]
No, but it builds on Zcash's work: Namada's pool extends the Sapling circuit developed for Zcash so that it can hold many assets, not one.[1][2]
No. A viewing key shows an account's balances; only its spending key can spend them.[15]
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