A state model says what the ledger records and what a transaction changes. Compare Profiles record it with these values. Account: the ledger keeps named records holding state such as a balance and a nonce, and for contracts code and storage; a transaction updates those records in place. UTXO: the ledger keeps discrete unspent transaction outputs, each with an amount and a spending condition; a transaction consumes whole outputs once and creates new ones. Designs that combine both are recorded as mixed, and other designs as other, with the chain's own term in its profile.
Key idea. Accounts resemble named state records that change in place; unspent outputs resemble individually constrained objects that are consumed once.
Example
A payment can consume a larger output and create a recipient output and a change output. A wallet sums the outputs it tracks; its display does not turn the protocol into an account ledger.
Keep in mind
- Neither account nor output models automatically guarantee privacy, parallel execution, or application safety.
Sources
- Ethereum accounts (external site)
- Bitcoin whitepaper, section 9: Combining and Splitting Value (external site)