This repository is the canonical location for development and documentation of inter-chain standards utilised by the Cosmos network & interchain ecosystem. Initially it will be used to consolidate design documentation for the inter-blockchain communication protocol (IBC), encoding standards for Cosmos chains, and miscellaneous utilities such as off-chain message signing.

Please see ICS 1 for a description of what a standard entails.

To propose a new standard, open an issue. To start a new standardisation document, copy the template and open a PR.

See PROCESS.md for a description of the standardisation process.

Quick references & interchain standards can be read as a single PDF.

The subject of most initial interchain standards is the inter-blockchain communication protocol, "IBC".

If you are diving in or planning to review specifications, the following are recommended reading:

• IBC Architecture
• IBC Design Principles
• IBC Terminology
• IBC Usecases
• IBC Design Patterns
• IBC specification progress tracking

All standards in the "draft" stage are listed here in order of their ICS numbers, sorted by category.

Directed arrows indicate a dependency relationship (that origin depends on destination).