Internet Computer Protocol ($ICP) is the decentralized internet which finally makes any Web3 dapp as easy to use as a Web2 app!

What is ICP?

Decentralized Cloud

Decentralized Servers

Decentralized Internet

Who Created ICP?

Use Cases

L1 Comparison

Join The Ecosystem

Learn

How-To Guides

Documentation

Follow

X Accounts (Formerly Twitter)

Chat Groups

Explore

Invest

Build

Contribute

Help us improve this ecosystem guide! Share your ideas, additions, and edits through our quick Feedback Form. Your input is greatly appreciated!

Attribution

This ICP ecosystem guide was created with love by Code & State and with the support of the thriving ICP community. Code & State is a Web3 venture studio dedicated to making it easier to build and earn on the Internet Computer. Visit our website or watch this YouTube video to learn more, and follow us on X to stay in the loop!

ICP Glossary

• Decentralized Internet - This is effectively what ICP is, and what the entire goal of the Web3 industry has been waiting for. It’s a new version of the internet which is collectively owned by its users rather than a few centralized companies, where smart contracts and applications can run seamlessly and transform the way we interact so that we can build a fairer digital world.
• Web3 dapp - This stands for “Web 3.0 Decentralized Application”. It means an application where the control is decentralized across it’s users rather than being fully controlled by 1 company or group. The goal is for them to be public digital services available for everyone to use fairly, without fear of censorship or manipulation.
• Web2 app - This stands for “Web 2.0 Application”. It basically just describes any online service, project, or platform use can access through a website.
• L1 Blockchain - This stands for “Layer 1 Blockchain”. Examples include Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, and Solana. In an effort to scale, blockchains like Ethereum have had Layer 2 and even Layer 3 blockchain networks built on top of the original blockchain, which is called the Layer 1.
• Decentralized Cloud - Clouds are networks of enterprise-grade servers in datacenters, and they are used to host modern web applications. The top Web2 cloud service providers are Amazon Web Services, Azure, & Google Cloud, and they host/control over 60% of the internet. ICP is the very first full stack decentralized cloud network ever created.
• Decentralized Servers - Servers are powerful computers designed to serve web applications to client devices (like phones and laptops), and as such they are one of the most fundamental building blocks of the internet. ICP canisters can be described as “decentralized servers” to make them easier to understand, but more accurately they are an evolution of the “smart contract” concept into a decentralized WASM-based virtual machine.
• Smart Contract - A self-executing program hosted on a decentralized blockchain that processes trackable and irreversible transactions between participants so that they can execute an agreement or contract without needing to trust one another.
• Canister - An evolution of the “smart contract” concept into a decentralized WASM-based virtual machine which has advanced capabilities that enable the creation of full stack production-ready dapps with no centralized components.
• Gas - Blockchains are shared permissionless networks, and “gas” is the economic value that users of the network pay to the node providers who keep the network running.
• Cycles - A token used to pay the gas/compute costs for canisters. 1 SDR (a stable value asset based on a basket of international currencies use by the IMF) worth of ICP tokens can be irreversibly burned to create 1 trillion cycles. This keeps the cost of cycles, and therefore network gas costs, stable despite ICP token price action. This removes the large gas price spikes which are common on other blockchains.
• DAO - Stands for “Decentralized Autonomous Organization”. It is a dapp that’s designed to trustlessly execute the collective will of a member-owned community which has no centralized leadership. This is typically accomplished through governance tokens available on the open market which grant any token holder voting rights for a specific DAO. A DAO might be used to manage the governance of a treasury or dapp.
• Public Ledger - Most blockchains are constructed on top of a public list of transactions which tracks the token balances for the accounts of users and smart contracts across the network. ICP is fundamentally different. For example, with Ethereum you can only build on top of their public ledger but you cannot create anything like ICP, whereas on ICP you can create public ledgers like Ethereum and even host an EVM L2.
• Immutable - In Web3 this typically refers to permanently destroying the ability of a dapp to be controlled so that no one will ever be able to make changes to how it works again.
• Oracles - Blockchains cannot directly connect to the normal internet because they need to remain deterministic to maintain consensus. In simple terms, this just means every node in the network needs to be able to arrive at the same answers every time they execute a function so that they can all agree on the result. The problem is that the normal internet gives different answers depending on when a node requests data. To solve this, most blockchains use a single trusted source-of-truth called an oracle which gives consistent answers that allow the blockchain to collect outside data while remaining deterministic.
• Cross-chain Bridge - A bridge is a combination of 2 smart contracts: one deployed on each chain that allows for cross-chain transfers of value. For example, ETH deposited into the contract on the main net will provide a balance denominated in (say) ERC-20 tokens on a sidechain like Polygon. Bridges are highly complex and they are often a target for clever exploits which steal user funds. ICP is called “bridgeless” because canisters can directly hold and control assets on other chains without the need for deploying a bridge smart contract onto that chain.
• NNS - Stands for “Network Nervous System”, and it’s a DAO which controls everything on ICP. The NNS is governed by a community of ICP users who stake ICP tokens for voting rights on DAO proposals which control everything on the network, including protocol source code updates.
• SNS - Stands for “Service Nervous System” which is a type of DAO which controls a specific ICP dapp. An SNS DAO is governed by a community of dapp users who stake the dapps native governance tokens for voting rights on SNS DAO proposals which control the dapp, including source code updates for that dapp.
• ZKP - Stands for “Zero Knowledge Proofs”, which is a class of cryptographic algorithms that make it possible to validate specific qualities of a set data, without the data being revealed. For example, a ZKP platform could make it possible for someone to prove they are over 21 to an online alcoholic beverage website without revealing their actual age or any identifiable information about themselves. This means web users could get the ability to prove specific things about themselves as needed (to retailers, advertisers, government agencies, etc) without ever losing any privacy.
• TPS - Stands for “transactions per second” and is a measurement for the overall speed of a blockchain.

Disclaimer: The mention of any individuals, organizations, or entities in this Ecosystem Guide is purely for informational purposes. Code & State does not endorse, support, or promote any of the mentioned parties. The information provided in this guide is intended to offer a broad overview of the ecosystem and should not be interpreted as an endorsement or recommendation of any kind. Use at your own risk, and do your own research.