Across is the bridge built on intents. A deposit names what the depositor wants on the other side (which token, how much, for whom) and locks the input in Across's SpokePool on the chain it leaves from. Relayers compete to deliver it from their own inventory, paying the recipient on the destination within seconds, and are repaid later out of the pooled deposits once Across's optimistic oracle settles the bundle that proves the fill.

That inverts the usual bridge. The user never waits on a message crossing chains; the relayer takes that wait and is paid for it in the spread between what was deposited and what was delivered. The spread prices the relayer's gas on the destination, the cost of its capital while it waits to be repaid, and a fee to the liquidity providers who back the system. On Base alone that carries well over a hundred thousand deposits a month.

The output amount is the whole contract. A deposit delivers exactly the amount it signs or nothing at all: a deposit no relayer fills by its deadline is returned to the account that made it. The right figure moves with gas on the destination and with how much a route is being used, so doing it by hand means quoting, signing at whatever moment someone happens to be looking, and hoping the quote still clears.

In a plug the deposit fires on a condition rather than a schedule, such as a balance landing, a price crossing or a position closing, with the amount the recipient receives signed in advance from Across's own quote, and the quote time and deadline taken from the block it runs in, so it is valid whenever it fires.

Proceeds swept to the chain where they are spent the moment they arrive. Balances kept topped up across chains without anyone watching. Transfers that land in seconds and never deliver less than they promised.