Creating Implicit & Named Accounts

Create implicit accounts through transfers and named accounts through parent-account contracts or CreateAccount actions.

You can create an account from a key pair or choose a readable name like alice.testnet. This guide walks through both options: creating implicit accounts and named accounts.

[!NOTE]

Install the NEAR CLI before starting. The examples below use testnet.

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Create an implicit account

Creating an implicit account takes two steps: generate a key pair locally, then send a transfer to its derived address.

Generate a key pair

The simplest way to obtain a public / private key pair is using the NEAR CLI:

near account create-account fund-later use-auto-generation save-to-folder ~/.near-credentials/implicit

# The file "~/.near-credentials/implicit/cf4342372b583606057805490c97d4778bc4ac444a76f32154634558ab57c3c5.json" was saved successfully

cat ~/.near-credentials/implicit/cf4342372b583606057805490c97d4778bc4ac444a76f32154634558ab57c3c5.json
# {"implicit_account_id":"cf4342372b583606057805490c97d4778bc4ac444a76f32154634558ab57c3c5","master_seed_phrase":"kit creek invite deputy fetch resource marble sweet camp thumb mushroom swift","private_key":"ed25519:5uJtH8hdYKPEhLVTn9EoxaneLpKh11qLEWDVvG6tKTeMUzsmf7isHYxXixhNcupRhUNQ2fHFgtKXy94YUXHfbxiG","public_key":"ed25519:Ex4stLtTe43ynFmxGweGzMWLvRmRSUP6EjU6nvAdY2vg","seed_phrase_hd_path":"m/44'/397'/0'"}

The file contains the generated key pair and implicit account ID. Your generated ID will differ from the example above. Keep the private key secret.

You can also generate a key pair using the near-seed-phrase library:

import { generateSeedPhrase } from "near-seed-phrase";
const { seedPhrase, publicKey, secretKey } = generateSeedPhrase();

Note that generating the key pair runs locally; the account will only be created on-chain when it receives a transfer.

Fund the account

Send NEAR to the derived address from a wallet or an existing funded account:

export SENDER_ID=alice.testnet
export IMPLICIT_ACCOUNT_ID=your-64-character-implicit-account-id

near tokens "$SENDER_ID" send-near "$IMPLICIT_ACCOUNT_ID" '0.1 NEAR' \
  network-config testnet sign-with-keychain send

After the transfer is confirmed, the implicit account is created on-chain and its public key is registered as a full-access key. You can then use the saved credentials to sign transactions from this account.

[!TIP]

You can initialize an account by making a transfer of 0 NEAR. This is because the cost of creating an account is covered through GAS fees, and not the attached NEAR amount.

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Create a named account

Named accounts are created through the top level accounts near in mainnet, and testnet in testnet. Both accounts possess smart contracts that expose the create_account.

[!TIP]

You can also simply use the NEAR CLI command near create-account to create a named account without manually interacting with the parent account's contract.

Call the parent account's contract

To create alice.testnet with 0.1 NEAR, call create_account on testnet using an existing account such as funding-account.testnet:

near call testnet create_account '{"new_account_id": "alice.testnet", "new_public_key": "ed25519:<data>"}' --useAccount funding-account.testnet --deposit 0.1 --networkId testnet

Replace ed25519:<data> with the public key generated above. The contract creates and funds alice.testnet and adds the new_public_key as a full-access key to the account.

[!NOTE]

If you are not going through an intermediary such as a wallet, you can generate an implicit account, fund it, and call create_account on near / testnet.

[!TIP]

You can initialize an account by using a deposit of 0 NEAR. This is because the cost of creating an account is covered through GAS fees, and not the attached NEAR amount.

Create a direct sub-account

If you control alice.testnet, you can trigger the CreateAccount action yourself to create a direct sub-account:

near create-account app.alice.testnet --useAccount alice.testnet --networkId testnet

The CLI builds the transaction that creates the account and adds its first key. You can add --initialBalance <amount in NEAR> to set its initial balance.

[!NOTE]

A parent account has no control over its sub-accounts after creation. Control depends on the access keys and contract installed on each account.

Use the testnet faucet

A faucet can create and fund a named testnet account for you, so you don't need an existing funded account. Choose an available .testnet name and run:

export ACCOUNT_ID=your-unique-name.testnet

near account create-account sponsor-by-faucet-service "$ACCOUNT_ID" \
  autogenerate-new-keypair save-to-keychain network-config testnet create

The CLI generates and saves your key pair, then asks the faucet service to create the account with that public key. Faucet-sponsored creation is available on testnet only.

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Create accounts from an application or contract

See NEAR API Libraries for named-account creation and Create a Sub Account for creating accounts from a smart contract.