XRP glossary: XRP Ledger terms explained simply

Whale: A wallet that holds or moves a very large amount of XRP. On this site we track every transfer of 1,000,000 XRP or more. See it live
XRP Ledger: The public, decentralized network where XRP lives. It has run since 2012 and confirms a new batch of transactions every 3 to 5 seconds. See it live
Ledger (block): Each validated version of the XRP Ledger record. It includes every transaction confirmed in those seconds and the final balance of each account. See it live
Address or account: The public identifier of a wallet on the XRP Ledger. It always starts with the letter "r", for example rN7n7otQDd6FczFgLdSqtcsAUxDkw6fzRH. See it live
Destination tag: A number attached to a payment so the exchange knows which customer to credit. If you forget it when depositing to an exchange, crediting can be delayed or need support. See it live
Reserve: The minimum XRP an account must keep to exist. Since December 2024 it is 1 XRP, plus 0.2 XRP for each object the account holds, such as a trust line. See it live
Fee: What is paid for each transaction, usually a tiny fraction of XRP. Nobody collects it: it is destroyed, so the total XRP supply slowly shrinks. See it live
Escrow: XRP locked by the ledger itself until a date or a condition. Nobody can move it before then, not even its owner. See it live
Ripple: A private San Francisco company founded in 2012 that uses the XRP Ledger and holds a lot of XRP. It is not the same as XRP and does not control the network. See it live
Ripple escrow: In 2017 Ripple locked 55 billion XRP in escrow. Up to 1 billion can be released each month, and Ripple usually locks most of it again. See it live
Amendment: A change to the XRP Ledger rules. It is enabled when more than 80% of trusted validators support it for two weeks in a row. See it live
Validator: A server that takes part in agreeing which transactions go into each ledger and votes on amendments. It earns no XRP for doing so. See it live
Exchange: A platform where XRP is bought and sold, such as Binance or Coinbase. It keeps its customers' XRP in its own wallets. See it live
Net flow: What goes into an exchange's wallets minus what goes out, in one day. If more leaves than arrives, XRP is said to be leaving the exchange. See it live
Internal transfer: A move between two wallets of the same owner, for example from an exchange to another of its wallets. It is not a purchase or a sale, so it does not count as flow. See it live
Rich list: The ranking of the wallets with the most XRP. A wallet with a large balance is not always one person: many belong to exchanges or to Ripple. See it live
Cold and hot wallet: A cold wallet keeps the keys offline, for example on a hardware device. A hot wallet keeps them on a connected phone or computer. See it live
XRP ETF: A fund that trades on the stock exchange and holds XRP. It lets people invest in XRP from a brokerage account without handling the crypto directly. See it live
Liquidation: The forced closing of a leveraged position when the price moves against it and the collateral is no longer enough. "Long" liquidations hit those betting on a rise. See it live
Open interest: The total value of XRP derivative contracts still open. When it rises, more money is betting on the price, in either direction. See it live
Funding rate: A periodic payment between those betting up and down in perpetual contracts. When it is positive, those betting on a rise pay. See it live
Market cap: The XRP price multiplied by the amount in circulation. It is used to compare the size of different cryptocurrencies. See it live
ISO 20022: An international standard for the messages banks send each other. It does not certify cryptocurrencies: "ISO 20022 crypto" lists are not official. See it live
Quantum exposure: An account becomes exposed when it signs its first transaction, because its public key becomes visible. A future quantum computer could use that to attack it. See it live