What is Tezos? Tezos, whose native asset is XTZ, is an open-source proof-of-stake blockchain for smart contracts, decentralized applications, digital assets, and on-chain protocol governance. Its defining feature is self-amendment: stakeholders can propose, test, vote on, and activate upgrades through the protocol, reducing reliance on contentious hard forks.
Core technology and architecture
Tezos uses Liquid Proof-of-Stake, allowing XTZ holders to delegate voting and consensus weight to bakers without transferring ownership of their tokens. Bakers produce and attest to blocks, while Tenderbake, the network’s Byzantine fault-tolerant consensus algorithm, provides deterministic finality after the required consensus threshold is reached.
Smart contracts run in Michelson, a strongly typed language designed with formal verification in mind. Developers can also use higher-level tools and languages that compile to Michelson. This security-oriented design is relevant to financial contracts, custody systems, tokenized assets, and other applications where coding errors can be costly.
The network also supports Smart Rollups, which execute application logic outside the main Layer 1 while using Tezos for settlement and verification. Etherlink is an EVM-compatible Layer 2 based on Tezos technology. Its Data Availability Layer, or DAL, provides additional bandwidth for rollups by distributing data across shards. The Ushuaia upgrade increased DAL bandwidth to 10 MB/s by June 2026.
Primary uses and applications
Tezos supports decentralized finance, exchanges, lending, stablecoins, liquid staking, NFTs, digital art, gaming, and tokenized real-world assets. Etherlink extends these uses to Ethereum-compatible applications and tools.
The ecosystem includes NFT marketplace Objkt.com and games such as Cricket Stars, Tezotopia, and PiXL. In August 2025, Tezos reported that Etherlink supported more than 11 active games and recorded 180,000 wallets during the preceding month.
Tokenization is another major focus. Spiko announced plans to deploy tokenized money-market funds on Etherlink, while Gearbox Protocol launched an Etherlink USDC vault using treasury-backed tokens. The ecosystem has also highlighted uranium tokenization through xU3O8, supported by Curzon and Archax, with physical uranium stored by Cameco.
Who is behind Tezos and where is it based?
Tezos was conceived in 2014 by Arthur Breitman and Kathleen Breitman. Arthur Breitman authored the 2014 whitepaper, and the founders established Dynamic Ledger Solutions, Inc., a Delaware-based company associated with the project’s source code and development.
A Tezos testnet became available in June 2018, and the mainnet launched in September 2018 after organizational disputes involving the founders, Dynamic Ledger Solutions, and the Tezos Foundation. The 2017 fundraiser collected 65,681 bitcoins and 361,122 ethers, or approximately $232 million based on contemporary reporting.
The Tezos Foundation is a Swiss foundation based in Zug and supervised by the Swiss Federal Foundation Supervisory Authority. It supports the ecosystem through grants and other capital deployment but states that it does not manage or operate the Tezos protocol. Development is distributed among organizations including Paris-based Nomadic Labs, France-based Marigold, London-based Trilitech, and Functori. These organizations contribute to protocol upgrades, Octez infrastructure, rollups, and ecosystem development.
Consensus and network security
Bakers participate in block production, attestation, and governance according to their stake. XTZ holders can delegate to a baker without giving up custody. Direct staking places funds into a security deposit associated with a delegate and can expose them to slashing for prohibited consensus behavior.
Current Octez documentation identifies 6,000 tez as an example of the minimum stake for baking and voting rights. The earlier 10,000-XTZ threshold is historical. Tezos governance operates through defined amendment periods, allowing changes to consensus, issuance, execution, and scalability to pass through proposal, testing, and voting stages.
Tokenomics and market data
XTZ pays transaction and smart-contract fees and is used for staking, delegation, governance, and applications. CoinStats recorded a price of $0.316, a 24h change of -0.64%, a market cap of $346.80M (rank #196), and 24h volume of $11.49M on 1 October 2026 at 02:40 UTC.
The circulating supply was 1,097,585,324 XTZ, while the total supply was 1,117,555,819 XTZ. Tezos does not have a fixed maximum supply in the cited protocol documentation. New XTZ can be issued as participation rewards, liquidity-baking subsidies when active, or protocol-approved invoices. Adaptive Issuance adjusts rewards according to the proportion of tez staked, with a 50% target under the Paris protocol. Quebec added an Adaptive Maximum to limit issuance and reduced delegated-funds weighting from 50% to 33% for baking rights and voting power.
Partnerships, advantages, and development
Google Cloud became a Tezos baker and has supported node and indexer infrastructure. Ubisoft has operated as a corporate baker, Ledger supports Tezos delegation and Etherlink, and Red Bull Racing announced a multi-year technical partnership. Jumper Exchange also integrated Etherlink and enabled bridging with more than 50 networks.
Tezos’ main advantages are self-amending governance, liquid staking participation, formal-verification-oriented smart contracts, proof-of-stake efficiency, and layered scaling through Smart Rollups, Etherlink, and the DAL. Recent upgrades include Quebec in January 2025, Rio later in 2025, Tallinn’s proposal for six-second blocks, and Ushuaia’s 10 MB/s DAL capacity. These developments target faster settlement, more flexible staking, greater rollup throughput, and broader use in DeFi, gaming, tokenization, and institutional applications.