Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO)
Also known as: DAO, On-chain Organization, Blockchain Collective
An organization governed by smart contracts and token-holder consensus, without central authority.
A Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) is a blockchain-based entity governed by smart contracts and the collective decision-making of its token holders. DAOs eliminate centralized control by encoding governance rules directly into the protocol, enabling transparent voting, treasury allocation, and protocol upgrades. Use cases include venture DAOs, grant funding, NFT communities, and decentralized governance for DeFi projects. DAO frameworks rely on governance tokens, on-chain proposals, and quorum mechanisms to execute actions.