LEARNING CENTER
Blockchain Glossary
Fifty essential terms — from account abstraction to ZK rollups — explained in plain English.
- Account abstraction
- Lets wallets behave like programmable smart accounts — enabling social recovery, gas sponsorship and batched transactions.
- Airdrop
- A distribution of tokens to wallet addresses, often to reward early users.
- Appchain
- A blockchain dedicated to a single application or ecosystem, giving it its own blockspace and rules.
- Blob
- A cheap, temporary data container on Ethereum introduced by EIP-4844 for rollup data.
- Block
- A batch of transactions bundled together and added to the chain.
- Block explorer
- A website for searching blocks, transactions and addresses on a chain.
- Bridge
- A system that moves assets or messages between blockchains. Historically one of the riskiest components.
- Consensus
- The process by which nodes agree on the current state of the chain.
- dApp
- A decentralized application whose backend logic runs on smart contracts.
- Data availability (DA)
- The guarantee that a chain's transaction data is published and retrievable so anyone can verify it.
- DeFi
- Decentralized finance — lending, trading and other financial services built on smart contracts.
- DePIN
- Decentralized physical infrastructure networks that use tokens to coordinate real-world hardware.
- EVM
- The Ethereum Virtual Machine — the runtime used by Ethereum and many compatible chains.
- Finality
- The point at which a transaction can no longer be reversed.
- Fork
- A split in a chain's history or rules. Hard forks change rules in incompatible ways.
- Fraud proof
- A proof used by optimistic rollups to challenge an invalid state during a dispute window.
- Gas
- The fee paid to execute transactions and computation on a chain.
- Gas token
- The token used to pay gas on a chain. Many rollups let you choose a custom one.
- Genesis block
- The very first block of a blockchain, defining its initial state.
- Hash
- A fixed-length fingerprint of data; changing the data changes the hash completely.
- IBC
- Inter-Blockchain Communication — the protocol Cosmos chains use to talk to each other.
- Layer 1 (L1)
- A base blockchain that provides its own security and consensus, such as Ethereum or Solana.
- Layer 2 (L2)
- A network that executes transactions off the L1 and settles back to it, inheriting its security.
- Layer 3 (L3)
- A chain that settles to an L2 rather than directly to an L1, often app-specific.
- Liquidity
- How easily assets can be traded without moving the price.
- Mainnet
- The live, production version of a blockchain where assets have real value.
- Merkle tree
- A data structure that lets you prove a piece of data is part of a larger set efficiently.
- Multisig
- A wallet that requires several keys to approve a transaction.
- Node
- A computer running blockchain software that stores and validates the chain.
- Optimistic rollup
- A rollup that assumes transactions are valid unless challenged with a fraud proof.
- Oracle
- A service that brings off-chain data, like prices, on-chain.
- Private key
- The secret that controls a wallet. Whoever holds it controls the funds.
- Proof of Stake
- Consensus where validators lock up tokens as collateral to propose and attest blocks.
- Proof of Work
- Consensus where miners expend computation to propose blocks.
- RaaS
- Rollups-as-a-Service — managed platforms that launch and operate rollups for you.
- Rollup
- A scaling chain that executes transactions off-chain and posts data and proofs to a base layer.
- RPC endpoint
- The URL apps and wallets use to read from and send transactions to a chain.
- RWA
- Real-world assets — traditional assets such as treasuries or real estate represented as tokens.
- Sequencer
- The component that orders transactions on a rollup before they're posted to the base layer.
- Settlement layer
- The chain where a rollup's state is ultimately finalized and disputes are resolved.
- Smart contract
- Code deployed on a blockchain that runs exactly as written.
- Stablecoin
- A token designed to hold a stable value, usually pegged to a fiat currency.
- Testnet
- A practice network with valueless tokens for testing before mainnet.
- Tokenomics
- The design of a token's supply, distribution, utility and incentives.
- TVL
- Total value locked — the value of assets deposited in a protocol or chain.
- Validator
- A node that participates in consensus by proposing or attesting to blocks.
- Validity proof (ZK proof)
- A cryptographic proof that a batch of transactions was executed correctly.
- Wallet
- Software or hardware that manages keys and signs transactions.
- ZK rollup
- A rollup that posts validity proofs, so withdrawals don't need a long challenge window.
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
L
M
N
O
P
R
S
T
V
W
Z
Not sure which stack fits? Take the 60-second wizard.
Answer five questions and get a recommended framework, data-availability layer and launch path.