Polkadot founder Gavin Wood says XCM v3 merged

XCM works across chains, smart contracts and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
It also supports communication between networks with different consensus mechanisms, like between Bitcoin and Polkadot.
Polkadot founder Gavin Wood announced XCM v3 had finally merged on Tuesday, 17 January 2023.

Polkadot, the scalable heterogeneous blockchain ecosystem, is currently one of the crypto industry’s most robust networks, and has a new feature to boot.

According to Polkadot founder Gavin Wood, the interoperability blockchain’s “cross-consensus message” formar (XCM) version 3 is finally deployed. Wood, who also founded Kusama, Ethereum and Parity Technologies, announced on Tuesday that XCM v3 had been in development for fifteen months.

After exactly 15 months in development, @polkadot XCM version 3 is merged. This enables bridges, cross-chain locking, exchanges, NFTs, conditionals, context-tracking and more. https://t.co/dqcLXOmDa9

— Gavin Wood (@gavofyork) January 17, 2023

How does XCM work?

XCM started with cross-chain communication between different chains at its core, before the shift to cross-consensus message – the aim of which is to avail a language by which different consensus systems can communicate.

The XCM design offers instructions on how to compose, send, and interpret messages across chains. The destination chain is the one that executes the instructions, with support for programmable, trustless and rich data.

Basically, XCM is standard through which protocol developers can define data and origins that their particular chains can send to or receive from. For instance, a developer can leverage XCM to allow for communication between Bitcoin (a proof-of-work network) and Polkadot (a proof-of-stake network).

But XCM v3 deployment does more than just to enable cross-consensus communication between chains. It can work across smart contracts, bridges, pallets, exchanges, and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

An example is where message format allows interoperability between parachains, removing the need to use bridges.