Zhu, YunruiMa, Jing2025-05-192025-05-192025-05-12IEEE Access, ISSN: 2169-3536 (Print); 2169-3536 (Online), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), 13(99), 1-1. doi: 10.1109/access.2025.35689252169-35362169-3536http://hdl.handle.net/10292/19229Conflict-free Replicated Data Types (CRDTs) are vital for achieving strong eventual consistency in distributed systems, but their development and evaluation face significant challenges by inadequate tooling. While CRDT research focus on algorithms and applications, critical gaps persist in validation and performance benchmarking. To address this, a novel Rust-based framework “Crust” designed to offer a modular, configurable, and extensible platform for developing, validating, and benchmarking CRDT implementations. Crust includes Core, Config, Network, Validation, and Benchmark moduels, supporting various synchronization methods and emphasizing correctness and performance analysis. This paper details Crust’s design and theoretical basis, showing how it bridges the gap between CRDT theory and practice, addressing tooling gaps to enhance adoption and real-world use. By enabling rigorous testing and performance evaluation, Crust has the potential to accelerate the development and adoption of CRDTs in real-world distributed systems.© 2025 The Authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/46 Information and Computing Sciences4609 Information Systems08 Information and Computing Sciences09 Engineering10 Technology40 Engineering46 Information and computing sciencesCRDTsconflict-free replicated data typesdistributed systemsrustJournal ArticleOpenAccess10.1109/access.2025.3568925