RenderToken Project Documentation

What is RenderToken and the RNDR network


RenderToken is the distributed GPU render network by OTOY Inc. (https://otoy.com/). It is similar to other distributed compute projects like Folding at Home or SETI. The project is based based on the Ethereum blockchain and RNDR is an ERC-20 utility token used to exchange for GPU compute power.

The network went productive in spring 2020 and 3D Artists with a OctaneRender® subscription (Studio, Enterprise, Box) can log in and use the network for rendering their work: Artist Guide to Using The RNDR Network

Running render nodes for the network is currently limited to the participants of the genesis token sale. More render nodes will be added as the network is growing: General information for RNDR Node Operators & RNDR interest form

Mission RNDR: The truly open Metaverse

RNDR is more than a decentralized marketplace to exchange rendering power using blockchain technology. It is also a foundation for monetizing authorship in a marketplace where virtual creations and ideas are exchanged with meaning and intent as their main sources of value — added on top of a base “manufacturing” cost.

Inspired by the book Life After Television (written 1990 by OTOY Advisor Board member George Gilder), Jules Urbach wrote a Medium post called Life After Automation: The Rendering Economy. This prediction what the future will look like is the motivation for RNDR and highlights a new model of value exchange:

“A first principle in the “Render Economy” is that the resonance of authentic human thought, creativity and imagination are the fundamental units of currency"

"Our complete personal experience is a uniquely human metric by which we constantly measure qualia, social resonance and novel truths. No machine can ever do this more authentically and meaningfully than we do. In a decentralized, dematerialized and fully automated world, the flow and final evaluation of human value must never stop being a human responsibility.”

“The Render Token and the network that it encompasses are built to enable such a system’s viability as early as possible. First, through massive cost savings in distributed rendering that bootstrap the render economy in its early stages. Then, in subsequent phases to come, through a semantic web of value and authorship encoded in the blockchain itself.”

The Co-CEO of Endeavor and OTOY and RNDR Advisor Board member Ari Emanuel also referenced to Gilder’s book in his medium post This is Life After Television:

“Since then, Jules and I have been building a system for the future. It will all be built on RNDR. We have lined up and signed deals with all of the major media companies from Disney and HBO to Facebook and Unity. LightStages will be built at our WME offices for blockchain based scans of all our clients and athletes. I am driving media to go through the Render Token network.” - Ari Emanuel

Based on this prediction Jules Urbach also wrote the blog post A Photon Driven Economy as an example of how RNDR<->BAT could work. The token will allow for cross-token development and services (BAT, Sia, etc.)

“The Internet was built on the promise of distributed computing and the open exchange of ideas and data. As we move from hypertext and hypermedia to a fully immersive metaverse built on complex interactive 3D scenes, the challenges and opportunities are exponentially greater.”

“The RNDR Token, powered by the blockchain, uses the act of creation — rendered by the laws of physics and light — to open the door to a new model of value exchange and a truly decentralized Metaverse.”

Co-creator of Basic Attention Token BAT, JavaScript creator, co-founder of Mozilla, and also OTOY and RNDR Advisor Board member, Brendan Eich wrote on his blog post The Render Token:

"Large shared AR/VR worlds cannot possibly “encrypt what you see” (as DRM for fixed media tries to do). Yet creators of models and art in such shared virtual worlds need effective and fair protection, as experience from Second Life shows.

Indelible watermarking is a key part of the solution. [..]

I’m honored to be an advisor to OTOY and RNDR. I’m thrilled by the prospects for RNDR, BAT, and other domain-specific tokens that will bind the Metaverse economy into a coherent and equitable, yet decentralized, whole. The future will be tokenized!" - Brendan Eich

This vision of a truly decentralized and therefore open Metaverse is what connects OTOY with many other though leaders in the 3D and entertainment industry. Among others Star Wars director and OTOY and RNDR Advisor Board member J.J. Abrams:

As technology continues to become democratized — including the sort of remarkable results you can get with Octane — more diverse and unique stories will be told. Worlds, familiar and extraordinary, will be created and distributed in ways that could not have been imagined a decade ago. ” - J.J. Abrams

From the Games and Virtual Reality industry OTOY's work also gets acknowledgment from pioneers like Tim Sweeney, CEO Fortnite maker Epic Games and publicly pushing for the creation of the Metaverse, and John Carmack, Developer of Doom/Quake and former CTO Facebook Oculus VR, in a 2017 story about Jules Urbach’s Quest To Realize Star Trek’s Holodeck.

“OTOY is juggling a lot of widely different tech, but if you squint at it right, there are a lot of pieces that fit together in a particular vision of the future.” - John Carmack

News & Updates



RNDR Roadmap Presentations 2020:



For the most recent updates make sure you check The RNDR blog on Medium.


Videos explaining the RNDR Network:

The following videos from the CEO of u/OTOY, Jules Urbach, provide a high-level view of the project:


All OTOY presentations from 2013 to 2020 at leading industry conferences GTC, GDC and SIGGRAPH:


r/crypt0snews Crypto News YouTuber


r/AdoredTV Tech YouTuber


r/Octane Andrey Lebrov Octane artist and CG tutorials YouTuber


r/DataDash Nicholas Merten cryptocurrencies, data analytics & science YouTuber


Blocktrainer.de blockchain technology YouTuber (German)


John Carmack (Developer of Doom/Quake and former CTO Facebook Oculus VR)


RNDR Network Partners:


RNDR Network showcases:

An example of videos all fully rendered on the network during beta:


More videos of the render node application and the artist platform: https://vimeo.com/rendertoken


RNDR Tokens

Find all recent details on CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko.

Read the token metrics deep dive (Jun 26 2020) about supply, allocations and past token sales.

  • Circulating Supply: 123m RNDR

  • Total Supply: 536m RNDR

  • Max Supply: 536m RNDR



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