Learn · Glossary
Crypto glossary: every term in plain English
Seed phrase, gas, spread, halving: crypto is full of jargon. You'll find it all here, explained briefly in plain English. Search for a word or click a letter.
50 terms
A
- Airdrop
- Free crypto that a project hands out, often to early users. Sometimes it's genuine, sometimes it's bait for a scam. Read more
- Altcoin
- Any crypto that isn't bitcoin.
- ATH
- All-time high: the highest price ever.
B
- Bear market
- A long stretch of time when prices keep falling.
- Block
- A bundle of transactions added to the blockchain in one go. On Bitcoin that happens roughly every ten minutes.
- Blockchain
- A public record of transactions, split into blocks that are linked together. Anyone can look, and nobody can quietly change old blocks. Read more
- Bull market
- A long stretch of time when prices keep rising.
C
D
- DCA
- Dollar-cost averaging: buying a fixed amount at regular intervals, whatever the price does. Read more
- DeFi
- Decentralised finance: borrowing, saving and swapping through smart contracts, with no bank or company in the middle. Read more
- DYOR
- Do your own research: look into it properly yourself before you put money into anything. Read more
E
F
- FOMO
- Fear of missing out: the worry that you'll miss the boat. It's why people so often get in too late and pay too much.
- Fork
- A split in, or change to, the rules of a blockchain. Sometimes you end up with two coins, like bitcoin cash in 2017.
G
- Gas
- The transaction fees on Ethereum, paid in ether. The busier the network, the more you pay. Read more
- Gwei
- A billionth of an ether. Gas fees are usually shown in gwei.
H
- Halving
- The moment, roughly every four years, when the reward for a new bitcoin block is cut in half. Read more
- Hardware wallet
- A small device that keeps your private keys offline. Read more
- Hashrate
- The computing power miners use to find new blocks. The higher it is, the safer the network. Read more
- HODL
- Holding on for the long haul, whatever happens. It started as a typo for ‘hold’ on a bitcoin forum.
K
- KYC
- Know your customer: having your identity checked by a platform. At exchanges in the EU it's compulsory.
L
- Layer 2
- A network on top of a blockchain that makes transactions faster and cheaper, like Lightning on Bitcoin or Arbitrum on Ethereum.
- Lightning Network
- A layer 2 on top of Bitcoin for fast, cheap payments. Read more
- Limit order
- An order that only goes through at your price, or better. Read more
- Liquidity
- How easily you can buy or sell something without moving the price.
M
- Market order
- An order that goes through straight away, at the best price available at that moment. Read more
- Memecoin
- A coin that's mostly about a joke or a hype, without much real use behind it. Read more
- MiCA
- Europe's crypto law. It has covered stablecoins since June 2024, and since late December 2024 the companies offering crypto services as well. Read more
- Mining
- Doing computing work to make new blocks, in return for a reward. Read more
N
- NFT
- Non-fungible token: a unique digital proof of ownership on a blockchain.
- Node
- A computer that keeps track of the blockchain and checks all the rules for itself. Read more
P
- Private key
- The secret key that lets you spend your crypto. Whoever has it has your crypto. Read more
- Proof of stake
- Securing a blockchain with collateral instead of computing power. That's how Ethereum works. Read more
- Proof of work
- Securing a blockchain with computing work. That's how Bitcoin works. Read more
R
- Rug pull
- A scam where the people behind a project suddenly run off with the money. Read more
S
- Satoshi
- The smallest unit of bitcoin: one hundred-millionth. Read more
- Seed phrase
- A list of 12 or 24 words that lets you restore your wallet. Never share it with anyone, ever. Read more
- Slippage
- The difference between the price you expected and the price you actually got. Read more
- Smart contract
- A program on a blockchain that does exactly what's written in it. Read more
- Spread
- The difference between the buy price and the sell price on an exchange. Read more
- Stablecoin
- Crypto that aims to stay worth the same as ordinary money, such as the euro or the dollar. Read more
- Staking
- Locking up crypto to help secure a network, in return for a reward. Read more
- Stop-loss
- An order that sells automatically if the price drops below a level you've picked. Read more
T
- Token
- A coin that runs on an existing blockchain, such as a stablecoin on Ethereum.
V
- Volatility
- How sharply a price swings up and down.
W
- Wallet
- An app or device for managing your crypto. Strictly speaking, it stores your keys, not your coins. Read more
- Whale
- Someone holding so much of a coin that they can move the price.
- White paper
- The document in which the people behind a project explain it. Bitcoin started with a nine-page white paper. Read more