Chain 28001. The same node software that runs mainnet, with hybrid post-quantum consensus (every 32nd block carries a Falcon-512 validator certificate under its hash) and the enforcement of those seals switched on, and free test tokens so you can build and break things without spending real AERE.
https://testnet-rpc.aere.networkwss://testnet-rpc.aere.network/wstUSD is an ERC-20 with EIP-3009 (transferWithAuthorization) at 0x8215bA247a3574af8EBC36606eB437811E318FBd, 6 decimals, no value: call faucet() from any funded address for 100 tUSD per hour. An x402 v2 facilitator for this chain answers at https://testnet-rpc.aere.network/x402/ (GET /supported, POST /verify, POST /settle) and settles the "exact" scheme on tUSD, sponsoring the gas. A real payment is pushed through it every six hours; the latest result is public at x402-proba.json, next to the load-bench result. Live since 2026-09-02. Mainnet has neither yet: it needs a real EIP-3009 asset first.
Want AERE on your own machine instead? docker run --rm -p 8545:8545 git.aere.network/aere-network/devnet:latest starts the validators' own binary as a local one-validator chain (id 28002) with DEBUG and TRACE open.
The testnet carries mainnet's consensus rules, and new consensus stages arrive here first, so what you observe here is what mainnet does or will do. The differences are heights, the number of validators, and the stages mainnet has not activated yet (here, post-quantum message authorship from block 3,117,000 and headers without ECDSA seals from block 3,131,000). Measured 2026-10-01: the public read nodes of both chains report the same build in web3_clientVersion.
| Testnet 28001 | Mainnet 2800 | |
|---|---|---|
| Validators / quorum | 5 / 4 (Besu 4, Nethermind 1) | 10 / 7 |
| Block period | 500 ms from block 1 | 500 ms |
| Post-quantum precompiles (Falcon, ML-DSA, SLH-DSA) | from genesis | live |
| Post-quantum certificate under the block hash (every 32nd block) | from block 64; four of five Falcon-512 seals required since block 2,988,864 (three from block 128) | live; seven of ten seals required since block 20,715,632 (six from 2026-08-21, of nine then) |
| Post-quantum seals on every consensus message | emitted from block 200; enforced from block 1000 by the four Besu validators; by the Nethermind validator on commits from block 1,314,403 and on all four types from block 3,117,000 (AIP-22 stage 4) | emitted on all four message types; enforced by the nine Besu validators from block 17,250,000 (commit, 2026-09-05) to block 17,700,000 (prepare, 2026-09-08), and by the Nethermind validator on commits from block 18,131,633 (2026-09-11) and on the other three types from AIP-22 stage 4, whose height is not yet set (Corrected 2026-10-09: until that date this row gave the enforcement heights without the Nethermind validator's exception on either chain) |
| Beacon-root and history system contracts (EIP-4788, EIP-2935) | deployed in genesis | EIP-2935 history contract has code; EIP-4788 beacon-root contract has none (measured 2026-10-01) |
Verify it yourself: fetch any block whose number is a multiple of 32 above 64 and look at extraData; it carries the post-quantum certificate: about 4,100 bytes with the Falcon-512 seals of the five validators, and at every fourth such block (every 128 blocks) about 35 to 43 kB, with SLH-DSA-SHA2-128s seals as well. Ordinary blocks carry about 810 bytes, because since block 3,131,000 every header also carries its proposer's Falcon-512 seal and no ECDSA seals (measured 2026-09-24 over 600 consecutive blocks). The mainnet verifier at tools/verify-anchor.mjs (with falcon512.mjs, registry-v3.mjs and the dependencies of package.json next to it) runs unchanged against the testnet, checking the binding under the block hash, every Falcon-512 and SLH-DSA seal, and the published key manifests, including the testnet's post-quantum registry epochs, and, since block 3,131,000, the proposer's Falcon-512 seal on every recent header:
curl -O https://aere.network/tools/verify-anchor.mjs -O https://aere.network/tools/mpt.mjs -O https://aere.network/tools/falcon512.mjs -O https://aere.network/tools/registry-v3.mjs -O https://aere.network/tools/package.json && npm install RPC=https://testnet-rpc.aere.network MANIFESTS=https://testnet-rpc.aere.network/pq/manifests CHAIN_ID=28001 node verify-anchor.mjs
The testnet genesis, including the anchored Falcon-512 key registry, is served at /testnet-genesis.json so anyone can check what the chain was born with. The public interface of the testnet is the RPC above; node-to-node peering for outside operators is not open yet. If you want to run a testnet node, ask us and we will peer you.