Routes, bridges and swaps
A route is the whole journey from the asset you hold to the asset you want, on the network you want it on. Crossfold treats bridge and swap as one thing.
One route, not two products
Most tools make you bridge first and swap afterwards, on two sites, with two confirmations and two sets of fees. Crossfold asks a routing engine for the whole path at once. If the best way to turn USDC on Arbitrum into ETH on Robinhood Chain is a bridge followed by a swap, that is still one route and one confirmation for you.
The route header tells you what kind it is: bridge when the token stays the same, bridge + swap when it changes.
What the steps are
Every quote lists its steps. There are only two kinds:
- Approval, only for ERC-20 tokens. A signature that lets the route contract move exactly the amount you typed, on the origin network.
- Deposit. The transaction that starts the route. For ETH this is the only step.
After the deposit confirms on the origin network, a solver delivers the destination asset to your address. That side needs nothing from you.
Why it is fast
Crossfold routes through an intents-based engine. Instead of waiting for a canonical bridge to carry a message across, which can take minutes, you state what you want and a solver who already holds liquidity on the destination fills it, then settles behind the scenes. That is why most routes show a time of a few seconds.