Cryptopedia:
Dictionary of crypto slang
Definitions
Note: these definitions have been sourced from Punk 6529, Mags, Coinbase, Zeneca 33, New York Magazine (Sara Harrison) and more (including some edits and additions of our own).
*Note: if you have a suggestion of terms we should add to / remove from this list, please go to the Suggestion Box*
1:1 Art (noun): Art where each piece is unique (1 of 1). In contrast to PFP and Generative Art collections that range from 200 to 10,000 pieces typically.
“1:1 szn is coming soon.”
1/1 of X (noun): The way to think about PFP and Generative Art collections. Crypto Punks are 1/1 of 10,000. Fidenzas are 1/1 of 999. Each one is unique, but they belong to a coherent whole collection in contrast to 1:1 art.
AB (noun): Artblocks is a popular platform for generative art, that has three collections – "Curated," "Playground" and "Factory."
ABC (noun): Artblocks Curated – one of the three Artblocks collections.
Airdrop (verb or noun): Gifting of free coins, tokens or NFTs to your crypto wallet; often given as a reward to early users or early buyers.
“Early Ethereum Name Service (ENS) adopters were rewarded with a hefty airdrop.”
Alpha (noun): A term from the investing/hedge fund community representing the outperformance generated by the skill of the asset manager vs beta (the market's performance). Most people's alpha (IRL and in crypto) is beta in disguise.
“She dropping serious alpha today.”
Altcoin (noun): Refers to any cryptocurrency other than Bitcoin (sometimes refers to any cryptocurrency other than Bitcoin OR Ether).
"Solana is an altcoin."
AML (noun): Anti-money laundering regulation. Centralized exchanges need to make sure their users aren't engaging in money laundering.
Ape In (verb): To buy into a new coin or NFT project (can have various connotations, such as a taking on a large position relative to the rest of your portfolio).
“I just aped into Art Blocks.”
Bags (noun): The coins, tokens or NFTs in your portfolio. If you hold onto your coins until they become worthless, you’re unfortunately a bagholder.
"Fill your bags, this token is headed to the moon!"
BAYC (noun): Bored Ape Yacht Club – one of the most popular profile picture NFT projects.
Breeding (noun): A process of creating a new NFT out of an existing one (if the project allows for it).
Example: NFT game Zed Run allows you to take your NFT horses and "breed" them to create new (inferior) NFT horses.
Burn (verb): To destroy your coin, token or NFT.
Example: sending your NFT to an address you don't control in exchange for a different benefit (like a different token). "He burned his Golden Snail Food Token for a token for the Golden Snail DAO."
Buy on secondary (verb): When you fail to mint a project and have to buy on a resale marketplace like OpenSea.
Cope (verb): The opposite of FOMO.
Example: Failing to buy an NFT because one is coping with one's earlier error of not FOMOing at 1/10th the price. "I know Golden Snails are up 50x and heading to Christie's, but I didn't like the launch so staying out" "OK, LOL, cope" (Punk 6529)
Crypto Twitter (noun): Informal categorization for people on Twitter who tweet about crypto (and their Tweets).
“Check out Crypto Twitter for the latest news on crypto.”
DAO (noun): Decentralized Autonomous Organization; internet communities with a shared bank account.
This is a core concept in crypto, so learn more here.
Ded (noun): Dead.
“I sold my Fidenza for 5ETH. I am ded.”
Deceased (noun): Dead. See “ded” above.
DeFi (noun): Decentralized Finance; financial services executed without middlemen using blockchain technology.
This is a core concept in crypto, so learn more here.
Degen (noun): Degenerate, meaning taking unreasonably high trading risks.
“All non-Degen trading punished in Up Only 1:1 szn.”
Delist (verb): Delist your NFTs from OpenSea (i.e., no longer offer them for sale) because prices are rising rapidly and they might get sold (market expectations of their value has changed).
"Golden Snail 5ETH floor. Delist!"
Derivatives (noun): NFT projects derived from the original project. Term was first popularized with a wide variety of "alternative" punks.
“The intelligent view on derivatives is that they are fine, enhance the brand of the original and everyone should stay cool about them.” (Punk 6529)
Diamond hands (noun): 💎🙌 = hardcore adherence to the HODL philosophy (see below).
“My friend held on to SHIB despite it losing 80% of its value. Now she’s a billionaire. She has diamond hands.”
Discord (noun): A messaging platform heavily used by crypto and NFT communities. It’s where most groups (e.g., DAOs) organize and communicate.
“Want to join a DAO? Start by hopping into their Discord server.”
Dox (verb): Search for and publish private or identifying information about an individual on the internet, typically with malicious intent.
“The hacker threatened to dox its victims if they didn’t comply with his request.”
Dunk on (verb): To criticize or make fun of.
“Crypto Twitter didn’t like Jamie Dimon’s speech so they have been dunking on him all day.”
DYOR (phrase): Do Your Own Research = a disclaimer people use to remind others of the importance of researching any investment before taking a position.
“I just bought some ETH, but you should DYOR.”
Few (phrase): Short for “few understand.” Similar to "probably nothing" (see below), it is polite FOMO.
“MOMA bought a punk. Few.”
Flippening (noun): Colloquially coined in 2017, it refers to the possibility of the market capitalization of Ethereum (ETH) overtaking the market capitalization of Bitcoin (BTC) (although now it can refer to any coin overtaking the value of another coin).
“ETH is pumping today. The flippening is coming!”
Floor or floor price (noun): The lowest available asking price on OpenSea or other NFT marketplaces for an NFT collection as a whole or for a subset of the collection.
“Golden Snails have hit a 3ETH Floor, but Golden Snail Nerd Glasses are 12ETH floor this morning.”
FOMO (noun or verb): Fear of Missing Out.
Example: Buying an NFT because you are afraid of missing out on the next big thing. “I FOMOed into Golden Snails and I am not sure why.”
Fren (noun): Friend.
“Because we are all friends here on a happy mission quest together.” (Punk 6529)
Frog (noun): Refers to popular memes of Pepe the Frog.
FUD (various): Fear, uncertainty and doubt; catch-all for negativity, criticism or bad news about crypto.
Can be a noun (“that’s FUD talking”), adjective (“that’s a FUD price”) or a verb (“they FUD the project”). (Mags)
Gang gang (noun): “Nobody can explain it well. Basically frens with the same JPGs as you." (Punk 6529)
Gas (noun): The fee required to successfully complete a transaction on Ethereum (e.g., buying an NFT, exchanging currencies, etc.). Similar to a credit card processing fees or taxes – you pay for the ability to transact.
Gas cost to transact = gas units * gas price in gwei (like gallons needed * price/gallon for real world gas!) (Mags)
Gas wars (noun): When an NFT project is hot and too many people want to buy it, driving up the gas prices for the whole Ethereum network.
“I tried to mint the new Chain Runners project, but the gas wars made it too expensive.”
Generative art (noun): Art that is algorithmically generated, ideally in real-time when minted.
“She is a bright new star in Gen Art.”
GM (phrase): Good morning. Salutation used on Twitter and Discord to start the day.
“We say good morning to each other because we are a friendly, happy, optimistic global community and it is nice to say good morning to your friends as you start your day.” (Punk 6529)
GN (phrase): Goodnight. Salutation used on Twitter and Discord to end the day.
“We say good night to each other because we are a friendly happy optimistic global community and it is nice to say good night to your friends as you end your day.” (Punk 6529)
GOAT (noun): Greatest of All Time. Pure respect and homage.
“Punk 6529 has the best tweets about NFTs. He is the GOAT.”
Grok (verb): to understand.
“I know there is a lot of crypto slang. Do you grok?”
Gwei (noun): Gwei is to ether as cents are to dollars, but 1 ether = 1 billion gwei. NFT prices are expressed in ETH (e.g., 0.2 ETH) while gas is expressed in gwei (e.g., 90 gwei).
Hate to See It / Love to See It (phrase): These can have their normal English meaning or the opposite.
“Her NFT made the MOMA. Love to see it.” Or “Celeb cash grab project site down. Hate to see it.”
Hashrate (noun): The amount of computational power being used to process transactions on a given protocol / network.
“Bitcoin’s hashrate hit an all time high this week.”
HODL (phrase): Hold on for dear life. Refers to buying and holding your crypto even when the markets are volatile.
“The market is tanking this week but I am HODLing!”
Howey Test (noun): Reference to the U.S. Supreme Court case for determining whether something should be considered a security and thus is subject to disclosure and registration requirements under the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Under the Howey Test, something is a security if there is an "investment of money in a common enterprise with a reasonable expectation of profits to be derived from the efforts of others." (Investopedia)
IRL (phrase): In Real Life, otherwise known as the world beyond OpenSea, Twitter and Discord.
“After messaging on Twitter for over a year, we finally met IRL.”
"I see what you did there" (phrase): When you note a smooth move from one of friends, competitors and collaborators in the metaverse. A mark of respect mostly.
IYKYK (phrase): If You Know, You Know. This is like "few" – a polite form of FOMO in most, but not all usages.
“MOMA bought a punk. IYKYK."
JPGs or JPEGs (noun): Reference to NFTs that might be JPGs or GIFs or PNGs or audio files or video files or computer games. It turns a typical normie insult into a rallying cry given many normies think “but you are just buying JPGs, are you mad?” Response: “They will never steal our JPGs!”
KYC (noun): Know your customer = requirements from centralized exchanges for customers to provide identifying information to the IRS / government.
“To sign up for Coinbase, you need to do KYC.”
LFG (phrase): Let's F***ing Go. Used when you are excited about something.
“New Golden Snail mint. LFG!”
Lindy effect (noun): Theory that for certain non-perishable things like tech, the longer something has existed, the longer it is expected to exist into the future.
Example: "Something that has been around for a year is expected to be around for another year, but something that has been around for 100 years is expected to be around for another 100 years. This is an observable phenomenon. Amazon is more likely to be around in 30 years than a new startup, our kids are more likely to listen to the Beatles than to Olivia Rodrigo, and our grandkids’ grandkids’ grandkids’ are more likely to read Socrates than Dan Brown." (Packy McCormick)
LL (noun): Larva Labs – creators of Cryptopunks, Meebits and Autoglyphs.
Liquidity (noun): Amount of available crypto to use. For DeFi, it could be the amount of stablecoins available in a given trading pool. For NFTs, it could be the amount of ETH you have available to buy more NFTs. If you are illiquid, most of your crypto is already tied up in NFTs and you don’t have funds available to buy new ones.
Looks rare (phrase): Rarity is often a driver of value in the NFT space. Used ironically.
Example: “[Posts picture of steak.] Looks rare.”
Love to See It / Hate to See It (phrase): See "Hate to See It / Loave to See It" above.
Mam (noun): "Ma'am." Like Ser, this is a respectful way to introduce or share an alternative point of view.
“Mam, I prefer my Golden Snail.”
Maxi (noun): A maximalist. Derived from Bitcoin Maximalist, a maxi is someone who believes that his / her crypto-chain is above all the best. The phrase can also refer to owners of a specific NFT collection.
"He is a CryptoPunks maxi. He criticizes all other projects.”
Meatspace (noun): Another term for “IRL.” “Meatspace issues today. Car tire blew out.”
Memecoin (noun): A cryptocurrency based on a meme that was popular around the time it was invented.
Example: Dogecoin or Shiba Inu Coin).
Mint (verb): The act of initially issuing or creating a piece of art on the blockchain, either by the artist or the collector.
“I was fortunate enough to mint three of the original CryptoPunks. Now I’m a part of history!”
Moon (verb): To soar in price (also see "pumping" below).
“The price of that new coin doubled this week. It is mooning!”
Newbie (noun): Someone who is new to crypto. Also see “noob” below.
“I just started reading about crypto last week, so I’m a newbie.”
NFT (noun): Non-fungible token = certification of uniqueness stored on the blockchain that can represent any digital (photos, videos, gaming skin, etc.) or physical (e.g. basketball game ticket) good.
This is a core concept in crypto, so learn more here.
NFT Twitter (noun): Informal categorization for people on Twitter who tweet about NFTs (and their Tweets).
“Have you been reading NFT Twitter today? Sounds like there are some exciting new projects minting this week.”
NFA (phrase): Not Financial Advice = disclaimer people use to warn others to do their own research on any investment before buying in. Similar to DYOR (see above).
“I like the new project from Larva Labs. NFA.”
NGMI (phrase): Not gonna make it = often used to describe someone who showed bad behavior or missed an opportunity. Can be self-deprecating (“just sold X and it’s now mooning, I’m NGMI”) or used to describe someone else (“NFT skeptics are NGMI”).
Non-fungible (adjective): Unique. Investor Rex Woodbury always uses the analogy of a dollar bill to explain fungible vs. non-fungible. A dollar bill is “fungible” because you can exchange any dollar bill for any other dollar bill. But, if Michael Jordan signs one of your dollar bills, it becomes “non-fungible.” The signed dollar bill is now unique and not equivalent to either (a) an unsigned dollar bill or (b) a photo of the signed dollar bill.
Noob (noun): Newbie = someone who is new to crypto. Often used to describe one’s own mistakes.
“I sold too early. I’m such a noob.”
Normie (noun): Someone who doesn’t know much about or has avoided crypto.
“None of my normie friends understand what I do in crypto all day.”
Number Go Up (phrase): Short-sighted view by novice crypto speculators that the price of crypto will always go up.
“Keep buying more crypto, because number go up.”
Off-Chain and On-Chain (adverbs): Reference to whether relevant steps in any particular process are occurring visibly on the blockchain or are happening off-chain and then just executed on the blockchain.
“Our generative designs happen 100% on-chain.”
OG (noun): Original Gangster = the folks who were in crypto (or any community) early and earned respect.
“He is an OG CryptoPunk holder.”
OK Boomer (phrase): Sarcastic response used as criticism for someone you disagree with. Suggests that the person you are criticizing is older and doesn’t understand.
Person 1: “The Golden Snail is not real art.” Person: “OK Boomer, NGMI."
On-Chain and Off-Chain (adverbs): See "Off-Chain and On-Chain" above.
OS (noun): OpenSea = the largest marketplace to buy and sell NFTs.
“I missed the mint, so I bought my Bored Ape on OS.”
Paper hands (noun): 🧻🤲 = describes someone who sells too early and misses out on profit (or even sells at a loss), likely because they believed in the FUD.
“I sold SHIB when it started to dip. Now it’s skyrocketed. Paper hands.”
PFP (noun): Profile picture = a type of NFT designed to be used as a social media avatar (liked Bored Apes, CryptoPunks, etc.). They tend to be dropped in collections – think of it as a 10,000 member family where each member is unique but shares a last name.
“I love your BAYC PFP.”
PoS (noun): Proof of Stake (see below).
PoW (noun): Proof of Work (see below).
Probably nothing (phrase): Sarcastic exclamation meaning there is actually “probably something” there.
“Visa bought a CryptoPunk. Probably nothing.”
Proof of stake (noun): One of the two major consensus mechanisms cryptocurrencies use to verify new transactions, add them to the blockchain, and create new tokens. Proof of stake requires “validators” to “stake” their own crypto in exchange for a chance of getting to validate a new transaction, update the blockchain, and earn a reward.
This is a core concept in crypto, so learn more here.
Proof of work (noun): One of the two major consensus mechanisms cryptocurrencies (e.g., Bitcoin) use to verify new transactions, add them to the blockchain, and create new tokens. Proof of work requires virtual "miners" to use large amounts of computing power to solve challenging math problems and gain rewards
This is a core concept in crypto, so learn more here.
Pumping (verb): To soar in price (similar to mooning above).
“The price of that new coin doubled this week. It is pumping!”
Pump and dump (verb): A coordinated effort to artificially inflate the price of an asset and cash out before it tumbles back to earth. Cryptocurrencies with smaller market caps are particularly vulnerable to pump and dump schemes.
“I wouldn’t buy into that project. The team’s last project was a pump and dump scheme where they inflated the price and then cashed out.”
Punk (noun): Typically refers to CryptoPunks = one of the earliest and most popular profile picture NFT projects.
“I like your punk PFP.”
“Right Click Save As” or “Right Click Save” (verb): Common criticism of skeptics of NFTs. They ask why anyone would pay for an NFT when you can just “Right Click Save” it for free.
Rekt (verb): Wrecked = to lose badly.
“I bought EOS at the top and got totally rekt when it crashed.”
Roadmap (noun): The set of activities an NFT project (usually PFP) will plan to do to add value to a community. Roadmaps are viewed as desirable in PFP projects and insulting to ask for in art projects. Roadmaps need some care to not accidentally violate securities laws.
"I only buy PFP NFT projects that have a clear roadmap and a team I believe in.”
Rug (verb or noun): Short for "rug pull." See below.
Rug pull (verb or noun): Scam when a project makes big promises to raise money and then disappears with investors money.
“Be careful when trying new crypto projects. The team could rug pull you and run away with your money.”
Seems legit (phrase): "Seems legitimate" = the project looks serious and potentially with good prospects. Can be used straight or ironically about a project's prospects.
Person 1: “I am launching Baby Fast Food Golden Snails on Solana.” Person 2: “Seems legit.”
Ser (noun): Sir. Like "Mam," this is a way to respectfully introduce oneself or perhaps share an alternative point of view.
“Ser, I prefer my Golden Snail.”
Shill (verb): To be annoyingly loud about getting people to buy your art or your bags; or trying to generate FOMO among others.
“Here he goes again, shilling the Silver Snail.”
Shitcoin (noun): A cryptocurrency that likely has little value.
“Crypto novices need to be careful of all the new shitcoins that get launched each week.”
Sniping (verb): Getting a great deal (i.e., buying what one perceives to be undervalued).
“I sniped a Bored Ape when the floor price was 1 ETH.”
Stake (verb): Locking up an asset (e.g., ETH) to reduce supply in circulation, increase the value of the asset and increase security. You can also stake an NFT (reducing supply) in exchange for other benefits.
"She staked the 10 Golden Snails in exchange for 10 $GSnail tokens per day."
Sweeping the floor (verb): Buying all the NFTs in a collection that are available at the floor price.
“I believe in that NFT project and its team, so I swept the floor!”
Szn (noun): Season = market cycle. Crypto szns are accelerated IRL seasons. NFT szns are accelerated crypto seasons – might last as little as 1-4 weeks.
“This is the way” (phrase): A way to commend socially positive behavior.
“She never shilled her project. This is the way.”
Up Only (phrase): Originally popularized by @Cryptopathic for ETH. It is everyone's desired direction of NFT prices, certainly preferable to the less popular alternative of “Down Only.”
WAGMI (phrase): We’re all gonna make it = a rallying cry of the crypto community meant to express camaraderie and optimism. It is the opposite of NGMI.
“Crypto is such a collaborative community. WAGMI!”
Web1, Web2 and Web3 (nouns): The three eras of the internet. Web1 was “read-only;” Web2 is “read-write;” and Web3 is “read-write-own.”
This is a core concept in crypto, so learn more here.
Wen moon? (phrase): Ironic question referencing when the price of an asset will skyrocket.
Person 1: “Announcing our 6529 x Golden Snail collab.” Person 2: “Wen moon, ser?”
WGMI (phrase): We are Going to Make It. See WAGMI above.
Whale (noun): A person, entity or institution that holds a large amount of crypto.
“Fees are so high on Ethereum right now that only whales can use it.”
Weak hands (noun): Paper hands (see above).
White paper (noun): Research paper written by leaders of a new blockchain project providing a detailed technical and philosophical explanation of the project.
“Have you read the Bitcoin whitepaper by Satoshi Nakamoto? It’s one of the best things to read if you want to start learning about crypto.”
*Note: if you have a suggestion of terms we should add to / remove from this list, please go to the Suggestion Box*