Blockchain Glossary

Browse 28 blockchain terms defined in plain English, from the cultural dictionary of computing.

28 Blockchain Terms

Blockchain Forensics
The analysis of blockchain transaction history, wallet relationships, and on-chain behavior to investigate theft, laundering, fraud, or attribution. It often...
Blockchain Hype
The exaggerated excitement, marketing, and speculative enthusiasm that often surrounded blockchain-related products and startups beyond their practical...
Blockchain Security
The protection of blockchain systems, smart contracts, wallets, consensus mechanisms, and surrounding infrastructure against theft, abuse, and protocol...
Consensus
A process by which nodes in a distributed system agree on a single data value or state, even in the presence of failures. Algorithms like Paxos, Raft, and PBFT...
consensus mechanism
The algorithm by which a decentralized network agrees on the current state of the blockchain without a central authority. Common mechanisms include proof of...
crypto wallet
Software or hardware that stores the cryptographic private keys needed to sign transactions on a blockchain. Despite the name, wallets don't actually hold...
DAO
Decentralized autonomous organization — an entity governed by smart contracts and token-holder votes rather than a traditional management structure. Members...
Decentralization
The distribution of control, processing, or data across multiple independent nodes rather than concentrating it in a single authority. Core principle of...
DeFi
Decentralized finance — an ecosystem of financial applications built on blockchains that replicate traditional banking services (lending, borrowing, trading,...
EVM
Ethereum Virtual Machine — the runtime environment for smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain. Every node runs the EVM to execute contract bytecode...
Gas
A unit of computational effort in the Ethereum blockchain. Every operation in the EVM costs gas, and users pay gas fees (in ETH) to compensate validators for...
gas fee
The fee paid to validators for processing a transaction or executing a smart contract on a blockchain like Ethereum. Gas prices fluctuate based on network...
hard fork (blockchain)
A backward-incompatible change to a blockchain's protocol that permanently splits the network into two separate chains. Nodes that don't upgrade follow the old...
mining (crypto)
The process of using computational power to validate transactions and add new blocks to a proof-of-work blockchain. Miners compete to solve a cryptographic...
NFT
Non-Fungible Token — a unique digital token on a blockchain representing ownership of a specific asset (art, music, virtual land). Peaked in 2021 when a JPEG...
oracle (blockchain)
A service that feeds external real-world data (prices, weather, sports scores, API responses) into a blockchain, since smart contracts cannot natively access...
Payable
In Solidity, a function modifier that allows a smart contract function to receive Ether. Without the payable keyword, any attempt to send ETH to the function...
proof of stake
Proof of Stake (PoS) is a consensus mechanism used by blockchain networks to validate transactions and create new blocks, where validators are chosen based on...
proof of work
A consensus mechanism where participants must expend computational effort to propose new blocks, making it economically impractical to attack the network. The...
Reentrancy
A class of vulnerability where a function can be called again before its first invocation completes, leading to unexpected state. In smart contracts,...
rollup
A layer-2 scaling solution that executes transactions off-chain but posts compressed transaction data (or validity proofs) back to the main chain. Optimistic...
sidechain
An independent blockchain that runs parallel to a main chain (layer 1), connected by a two-way bridge that allows assets to move between them. Sidechains can...
Smart Contract
Self-executing code stored on a blockchain that automatically enforces the terms of an agreement when predefined conditions are met. Neither smart nor...
soft fork (blockchain)
A backward-compatible change to a blockchain's protocol where old nodes can still validate new blocks, even if they don't understand the new rules. Unlike a...
Solidity
The primary programming language for writing smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain and EVM-compatible chains. Solidity's JavaScript-like syntax belies the...
staking
The act of locking up cryptocurrency tokens to participate in network validation (in proof-of-stake systems) or to earn yield in DeFi protocols. Staked tokens...
Web3
A vision for a decentralized internet built on blockchain technology, where users own their data and identity. Coined by Ethereum co-founder Gavin Wood....
zero-knowledge proof
A cryptographic method that allows one party (the prover) to convince another party (the verifier) that a statement is true without revealing any information...

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