Harmony is an open-source blockchain for building decentralized applications (dApps). It uses a technique called state sharding, which separates a chain into segments that process transactions and store data in parallel, to support fast transactions. Harmony currently supports a thousand nodes across four shards, which work to produce new blocks every eight seconds with finality (no threat of a competing fork). The project has plans to add more shards and support more nodes in the future. The protocol's Effective Proof-of-Stake (EPoS) staking mechanism allows token owners to delegate their holdings to network validators but aims to reduce the centralization of delegated assets. Harmony has a native token, ONE, that owners can use to stake on the network in exchange for block rewards and pay for transactions.