In short
What is Cardano?
Cardano is a blockchain platform: a shared, public ledger that thousands of independent computers keep in sync without a company in the middle. It records who owns what, runs programs called smart contracts, and settles transactions in its own currency, ada. Development began in 2015 and the network went live in September 2017.
Two things set Cardano apart from the start. Its consensus protocol, Ouroboros, was the first provably secure proof-of-stake protocol, published and peer-reviewed before it was deployed. And since 2025 the protocol's own rules, upgrades and treasury are decided on the chain itself by ada holders, stake pool operators and an elected committee, not by a foundation or a company.
In plain terms: Cardano is a technology that lets people manage and exchange value, identity and governance over the internet, with rules that everyone can inspect and nobody can quietly change.
Ada
What is ada?
Ada is the currency of the Cardano network, named after Ada Lovelace, the 19th-century mathematician often called the first computer programmer. You use ada to pay transaction fees, to stake and earn rewards, to vote in governance and to pay for services in applications built on Cardano. The supply is capped at 45 billion ada, and new ada enters circulation only from a fixed reserve, as staking rewards and treasury funding.
Every ada also carries a stake in the network. You do not need to send it anywhere or lock it up to use that stake, which is one of the differences explained below.
How it works
How does Cardano work?
Three ideas explain most of what happens on Cardano: how the network agrees on the next block, how it keeps track of who owns what, and how tokens and programs fit in.
Consensus: Ouroboros
Time on Cardano is divided into slots of one second and epochs of five days. Slots are assigned at random to stake pools, weighted by how much ada is delegated to them, and the chosen pool produces the next block. Most slots stay empty, so a block appears roughly every 20 seconds. Because the choice is based on stake rather than computing power, running the network needs ordinary servers, not warehouses of mining hardware.
Accounting: the extended UTXO model
Cardano tracks ownership the way cash works, not the way a bank balance works. Your wallet holds a set of unspent notes (UTXOs), and a transaction consumes some notes and creates new ones. The model, called extended UTXO or eUTXO, lets your wallet work out exactly what a transaction will do and what it will cost before you sign it. There is no bidding for block space, and a simple transfer that would fail is rejected before it is submitted, so you do not pay for failures.
Programs: native tokens and smart contracts
Tokens on Cardano are built into the ledger. Creating or transferring a token uses the same rules as ada, with no smart contract needed. Smart contracts are validator scripts that approve or reject a transaction someone has already built, written in languages such as Plutus and Aiken.
Want the full picture, from slots to hard forks? Read how Cardano works step by step.
Read how Cardano worksWhy Cardano
What makes Cardano different?
Staking without strings
Non-custodial, liquid staking
Delegating ada to a stake pool never moves it out of your wallet. There is no lock-up period, no minimum beyond a small deposit, and no slashing: the protocol cannot take your ada as a penalty. You can spend or re-delegate at any time.
Fees you can predict
Deterministic transactions
A fee on Cardano is a simple formula of a fixed part plus the transaction size, set by protocol parameters rather than an auction. A typical simple transfer costs a fraction of one ada, and you see the exact amount before you sign.
Tokens built into the chain
Native assets
Any token on Cardano, from stablecoins to NFTs, is handled by the ledger itself with the same security as ada. No contract has to be written or trusted to move it.
Decentralized by design
Independent stake pools
Blocks are produced by around a thousand stake pools, run by hundreds of independent operators: individuals, companies and communities around the world. The protocol rewards pools for staying below a saturation point, which discourages any single operator from growing too large.
Backed by research
Peer review and formal methods
Cardano's core protocols were designed as academic research first, reviewed by other cryptographers, then implemented. The node is written in Haskell and the ledger is built with formal methods, so the code can be checked against its specification.
Governed on the chain itself
On-chain governance and treasury
Protocol changes, treasury spending and even the constitution are proposed and decided on-chain. Ada holders vote directly or delegate their voting power to a representative. Stake pool operators and a constitutional committee provide checks and balances.
Ready for regulation
MiCA-conform disclosures
Ada is covered by white papers that follow the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, and the Cardano Foundation works with regulators and standards bodies. That matters for exchanges, businesses and institutions that need clear disclosures before they can work with an asset.
Use cases
What is Cardano used for?
More than a hundred applications already run on Cardano: wallets, exchanges, lending, identity, games and more.
Browse Cardano appsGet started
How do I start using Cardano?
- Get a wallet: Your keys, your ada. Learn what a wallet is and pick one that fits you.
- Get ada: Find trusted exchanges and other ways to get your first ada.
- Stake your ada: Delegate to a stake pool, help secure the network, earn rewards.
- Have your say: Take part in governance and shape where Cardano goes next.
- Build on Cardano: Head to the developer portal and ship your first project.
Prefer a guided walk-through? The getting started page takes you from download to first transaction, and the learning path continues from there.
Start step by stepHistory
Who created Cardano and who runs it now?
Cardano was started in 2015 by Charles Hoskinson and Jeremy Wood and launched in September 2017. Three organizations shared the work at genesis: IOHK (now IOG) built the software, the Cardano Foundation was set up to oversee and promote the ecosystem, and Emurgo focused on commercial adoption.
Read about the genesisToday no single organization runs Cardano. Since the governance upgrades of 2024 and 2025, ada holders, delegated representatives, stake pool operators and a constitutional committee decide on protocol changes and treasury spending under a community-ratified constitution. Intersect, a member-based organization, coordinates development and maintenance. The network's evolution is recorded as a series of hard forks, each one an upgrade agreed by the community.
See every upgradeFAQ
Cardano is the blockchain platform. Ada is its cryptocurrency. People often use the names interchangeably, but when you buy Cardano on an exchange, you are buying ada.
Yes. Cardano has used the Ouroboros proof-of-stake protocol since launch. It never used mining, and blocks are produced by stake pools chosen in proportion to the ada delegated to them.
No. Delegating ada keeps it in your wallet, and the protocol has no slashing, so it cannot take your ada as a penalty. The only thing at risk is the size of your rewards if you pick a poorly run pool.
A new block is produced roughly every 20 seconds, so a transaction usually appears on the chain within a minute. Exchanges and applications typically wait for several more blocks before treating it as final.
Nobody controls it alone. Ada holders and their delegated representatives, stake pool operators and a constitutional committee vote on-chain on changes and spending. The Cardano Foundation, IOG, Emurgo and Intersect contribute, but none of them can change the protocol by themselves.
Anything from a token or an NFT collection (no contract needed) to full applications with smart contracts written in Plutus or Aiken. The developer portal has starter guides.