XRP and XRPL Terminology: A Glossary for Beginners
XRP and the XRP Ledger (XRPL) come with their own vocabulary, and a lot of it doesn't map cleanly onto general crypto terms you might already know. This glossary covers the terms you'll run into most often on this site and elsewhere, in plain language.
XRP — The native digital asset of the XRP Ledger. All 100 billion units were created at the ledger's genesis; there's no ongoing mining.
XRPL (XRP Ledger) — The open, decentralized blockchain that XRP runs on, maintained by an independent, distributed set of validators rather than any single company.
Ripple — A private fintech company that holds a large amount of XRP and builds products (like ODL) that use it, but does not unilaterally control the XRPL's consensus process. See our guide on Ripple the company vs. XRP the token.
Ledger (as in "a ledger") — In XRPL terms, a specific, sequentially numbered snapshot of the network's state, closed and validated roughly every few seconds.
Validator — Independent software run by many different operators (exchanges, universities, businesses) that participates in agreeing on the next ledger. See how XRPL consensus works.
Consensus — The process by which validators agree on the next valid ledger state without energy-intensive mining.
Trust line — A record that an account is willing to hold a specific non-XRP asset issued by a specific issuer on the XRPL. See what a trust line is.
Reserve — The minimum amount of XRP an account must hold to stay active on the ledger, plus a smaller incremental amount per additional object (like a trust line) it owns. See XRPL reserves explained.
Destination tag — A number some services (especially exchanges) require alongside a deposit to route funds to the correct account within their own shared address.
Drops — The smallest unit of XRP (1 XRP = 1,000,000 drops), analogous to satoshis for Bitcoin.
Escrow — A native XRPL feature that locks XRP until a time or condition is met; also the mechanism Ripple used to lock a large share of its own XRP holdings. See XRP escrow explained.
DEX (decentralized exchange) — On the XRPL specifically, a built-in, protocol-level order-book exchange, not a separate app. See the XRPL's built-in DEX.
Cost basis — What you originally paid (in your home currency) for the XRP you hold, used to calculate gain or loss when you eventually dispose of it. See our Tax Calculator.
Hot wallet / cold wallet — A hot wallet is connected to the internet (more convenient, more exposed); a cold wallet is kept offline (less convenient, more secure) — a general crypto distinction, not XRP-specific.
Seed phrase — The master secret that can regenerate a wallet's private keys. Never enter it anywhere; nothing on this site ever asks for one.
No-KYC — Describes a transaction or service that doesn't require identity-verification documents. Doesn't mean anonymous — the XRPL is a public ledger.
ODL (On-Demand Liquidity) — Ripple's cross-border payments product that can use XRP as a bridge asset between currencies. See what ODL is.
Whale — Informal term for an account holding a very large amount of XRP. See what whale-watching can and can't tell you.
Rich list — A ranking of the largest accounts by balance, possible because the XRPL is fully public. See our own Rich List tool.
ATH (all-time high) — The highest price an asset has ever reached. See our All-Time High Tracker.
Related reading
For deeper dives on any of these terms, follow the links above — each one leads to a dedicated guide with more detail. If a term you're looking for isn't here, our full guides index covers XRP topics in more depth than a glossary entry can.