A list of community-built developer tools on Cardano

Cardano’s community of developers is one of the strongest in blockchain. Many developers build and provide access to the tools and applications needed to improve Cardano.

Here is a list of available tools and resources:

Category list:

NFT creation tools

• Anvil: a developer agency that specializes in NFT minting, staking, airdrops, snapshots, and custom services.

• Buffy Bot: a Cardano NFT project publishing company.

• Cardano Native Token: builders, artists, and creators making Cardano native NFTs.

• Cardano Sounds: a platform trying to create a new economy inside NFTs where individual creators can use each other's work in a trustless manner. This could enable artists to focus only on their specialization and personal expression by earning royalties from their published pieces when other creators use them.

• CNFT Lab: the full web3 tool for minting #CNFTs, managing your policy ID, creating royalties, and starting to mint in a few seconds.

• Holograph (previously CXIP Labs): NFT minting protocol for creators, by creators.

• Minted with Lovelace: a decentralized full-featured launchpad DApp for launching fully automated NFT/Token minting, swapping, and auction campaigns.

• NFT-MACHINE: NFT minting platform.

• NMKR: create, manage, and sell NFTs with NFT-MAKER.IO PRO. We offer backend tools and services for brands, companies, and creators to help them build white-label NFT solutions.

• Peppermint: minting service for NFT projects based on the Cardano blockchain.

• Secret Goat Society: an investment club and minting service for Cardano NFTs.

• Stampd.io: a set of tools for blockchain timestamping and NFT creation.

• Tangocrypto NFT Studio: An easy-to-use NFT minting platform that allows creators to upload their collections and sell them. It doesn't require any technical knowledge and it gives sellers all the details about the sales, like income, fees, and transactions.

NFT displaying tools

• NFTCDN: A low-code service used to display Cardano NFTs on websites and apps eliminating the need for large up-front development and infrastructure investments. Using our high-performance NFT Content Delivery Network and innovative media optimisation tools, we aim to achieve the best end-user NFT viewing experience for speed, security and reliability.

Smart contract platforms

• Aiken: Cardano smart contract language and toolchain. The current version of the CLI application can only encode/decode Untyped Plutus Core to/from its on-chain format.

• Clear Contracts: Smart contract templates with non-dev UI.

• CTL (cardano-transaction-lib): a Purescript library for building smart contract transactions on Cardano. It aims to port the functionality and interface of Plutus off-chain code to the browser environment and NodeJS.

• Demeter.run: A cloud environment with all the tools for building your dApp. Cardano Node, DB-Sync, Ogmios with no setup. Ready to code workspaces on Haskell, Plutus, Rust, Python, and others. Deploy your dApp as a Docker image. Move to self-hosted at any time.

• eopsin: an implementation of smart contracts for Cardano which are written in a very strict subset of valid Python.

• Marlowe Playground: an end-to-end financial smart contract development platform.

• Monkey Contracts: smart contract creation and deployment platform.

• pyscc (Python Smart Contracts for Cardano): a prototypical implementation of smart contracts for Cardano which are written in a subset of valid Python.

Software libraries, APIs, interfaces, SDKs, digital product platforms

• "ADA" Visual Scripting VSCode Ext.: a VSCode plugin for Plutus/Haskell to visualize on-chain transactions, smart contracts, state machine, and more, using nodegraph 'flow' diagrams.

• .NET SDK for Blockfrost API: an open-source SDK for .NET developers.

• API3: API3 is leading the movement from legacy third-party oracle networks to first-party oracle solutions that deliver more security, efficiency, regulatory compliance, and simplicity.

• Atix: Atix are specialists in building digital products that require blockchain implementation. Always focused on enabling companies to shift from traditional systems to the decentralized future, since the early days of blockchain technology, Atix have helped businesses build and continuously deliver easily scalable products and top-notch solutions.

• Automint: a Python library for automating transactions on the Cardano blockchain.

• BlockFrost: API for Cardano providing abstraction between user and blockchain data.

• CanuckCrypto: a P2P money transfer platform with escrow Service.

• CardanoBI: a fully open-source business intelligence API layer for Cardano.

• Cardano Client Library: a Java client library for Cardano that simplifies the interaction with Cardano blockchain from a Java application.

• Cardano Rust SDK update for Alonzo: a widely used tool used by many exchanges and wallets to build an SDK for Cardano in a specific language.

• Cardano serialization library in Go: A serialization library for Go that provides many essential development libraries to encourage people to develop on Cardano.

• Cardano Sharp: CardanoSharp.Wallet is a Cardano Cryptographic and Serialization library for .NET applications.

• Drasil.io: A blockchain application framework that simplifies application development on Cardano.

• Kuber: Haskell library and json-api for composing Cardano transactions and working with off-chain cardano blockchain.

• libada-go: Golang library for Cardano network, used and maintained by Bitrue.

• Liqwid Developer Portal:Cardano SDK: JavaScript SDK for Cardano & the Liqwid Protocol.

• Mesh: Open-source library that enables Cardano integration with web applications, including Plutus, transaction building, minting, and more. Also comes with beginner-friendly guides.

• NFTada.io: a web interface for creating assets on Cardano easily. Includes an API for automated printing and distribution.

• Ogmios: Ogmios is a lightweight bridge interface for cardano-node. It offers a WebSockets API that enables local clients to speak Ouroboros' mini-protocols via JSON/RPC.

• Open CNFT Public Rest API: an open-source API for the CNFT tool.

• Lucid: a library that enables the creation of Cardano transactions and off-chain code for Plutus contracts in JavaScript, Deno, and Node.js.

• Pallas: An expanding collection of modules that re-implements common Ouroboros / Cardano logic in native Rust. This crate doesn't provide any particular application, it is meant to be used as a base layer to facilitate the development of higher-level use cases, such as explorers, wallets, etc.

• Plutus Extra: a now deprecated collection of Plutus libraries.

• PyCardano: a Cardano library written in Python. It allows users to create and sign transactions without depending on third-party Cardano serialization tools, such as cardano-cli and cardano-serialization-lib, making it a lightweight library, which is simple and fast to set up in all types of environments.

• Python Module: a Python module for Cardano.

• StricaHQTyphonjs Wallet: a pure JavaScript library for Cardano wallets.

• Tango Crypto: a suite of high-availability APIs and developer tools that provides you with fast and reliable access to the Cardano network so you can focus on building and growing your products.

Data services, blockchain integration, automation

• Blockery: a blockchain integration as a service platform.

• Cardano metadata oracle: first generation of oracles providing external data sources to Cardano.

• Fluree: solutions for secure, connected, and trusted data ecosystems.

• Heidrun: automation platform for Cardano that triggers various actions based upon detection of a payment to a wallet address.

• IntelliADA: an IntelliJ plugin for Cardano blockchain that enables developers to interact with Cardano directly from their IDE.

• Kupo: a lightweight, configurable, chain-index for the Cardano blockchain.

• Layer 2 Advanced Architecture/Alpha Chain/HydraGEN: A financial information and data services AI sidechain.

• Revelar: powerful Cloud infrastructure to bring your games to Cardano.

• Scrolls: a tool to build and maintain read-optimized collections of Cardano's on-chain entities. It crawls the history of the chain and aggregates all data to reflect the current state of affairs. Once the whole history has been processed, Scrolls watches the tip of the chain to keep the collections up-to-date.

Native tokens

• Starch Industries: the first native asset miner on Cardano.

Open source, developer tools, decentralized protocols, enterprise apps

• AdaDAO: open source tools to support DAO infrastructure and promote decentralization.

• Benjamin's Group: building tools for the future of Cardano.

• Boros: a backend tool that consumes a stream of Cardano transactions from different pluggable sources and takes care of submitting them on-chain in an orderly and resilient fashion.

• Cardano-Signer: a tool to sign and verify data with Cardano secret keys, support for CIP-0008 and CIP-0036 (Catalyst Voting/Delegation) signing

• Clarity Protocol: a multi-chain, accessible, decentralized protocol that supports democratic risk management and due diligence for the tokenized economy.

• Dandelion APIs: a set of developer tools to help with fast integration into the Cardano chain.

• Enlightenmint: a launch platform for some much bigger ideas infused with lighthearted energy and sprinkled with real utility.

• Five Binaries: an infrastructure development company focused on creating customized highly reliable solutions for blockchain-powered industries.

• Gimbalabs: Gimbalabs aims to mobilize everyone to develop tools and applications through a unique experience of co-creation that facilitates the adoption of the Cardano protocol, reveals new possibilities, and ignites the public imagination worldwide.

• GL Cardano Starter Kits: an experiment by Gimbalabs on how to inspire developers to build on Cardano. 

• Go Ouroboros Network: A Go client implementation of the Cardano Ouroboros network protocol.

• Joget: rapidly build enterprise applications and automate workflows, anytime, anywhere.

• Koios: a consistent query layer for developers to build upon Cardano, with multiple, redundant endpoints that allow for easy scalability.

• MintMatrix: a utility portal for decentralized ledgers offering tools and interfaces for digital asset management.

• Oura: a Rust-native implementation of a pipeline that connects to the tip of a Cardano node through a combination of Ouroboros mini-protocol (using either a UNIX socket or TCP bearer).

• Pirouette: a research prototype currently under development.

• SCALUS (Session Client Application Launch URI System): a URI protocol handler dispatcher. A protocol handler runs when the operating system attempts to launch a URI. The OS looks up an application that is registered to handle a particular URI protocol.

• StricaHQ: a company building open source developer tools for the Cardano ecosystem, powering Cardanoscan, a feature-rich blockchain explorer and analytics platform.

• ThirdWeb: a set of tools to help people bring projects to Cardano.

• TxPipe (parent to Oura): open-source tools and infrastructure for Cardano developers.

Stake pool tooling

• Ansible cardano-node: a cardano-node repository that contains an Ansible playbook for provisioning secure, optimized Cardano nodes for stake pool operators.

• Cardano Light Tools: a set of lightweight tools to operate and maintain a Cardano stake pool.

• Guild Operators Suite: a set of tools and scripts for setting up, managing, and monitoring Cardano stake pools, and also managing tokens and keys.

• Stake Pool Operator Scripts: a full collection of shell scripts to operate and maintain a Cardano stake pool, token minting, voting, and hardware wallet integration.

• Stake Pool Operator Tools Alliance (SPOTA): SPOTA brings together individuals in the Cardano ecosystem that provide tools for running and maintaining a stake pool.

Plutus-specific tools

• Fracada: Plutus DApp that enables users to fractionalize their NFTs.

• Fracada V2: il Primo: advanced Plutus fractionalized NFT protocol that supports "NFT Bag" functionality.

• Plu-ts: an embedded DSL for Cardano smart contracts creation coupled with a library for Cardano transactions, all in Typescript.

• Pluthon: a Pluto-like programming language for Cardano Smart Contracts in Python

• Pluto: a programming language, written in a Haskell-like human-friendly syntax.

• Plutonomicon: a developer-driven guide to the Plutus smart contract language in practice.

• Plutonomy: an optimizer for Untyped Plutus Core, that can be plugged into any Plutus compilation pipeline, by adding an extra pass.

• Plutonomy-cli: a simple command-line wrapper for Plutonomy.

• Plutus Playground: an environment for writing and testing smart contracts before they are released on the Cardano blockchain.

• Plutus fee estimator: this tool can be used to calculate fees for actual transactions (e.g. to determine the fees that will be charged if the network parameters change), and also to estimate fees for individual script transactions or complete DApps before or during development.

• UPLC (Untyped Plutus Language Core): a basic library to support creating and manipulating programs written in Untyped Plutus Core. It can parse, reformat, evaluate or build contract artifacts from Untyped Plutus Core code.

Domain-specific languages

• Helios: a domain-specific language that compiles to Plutus Core (i.e. Cardano on-chain validator scripts). Helios is a non-Haskell alternative to Plutus.

• Plutarch: a typed embedded domain-specific language (eDSL) in Haskell for writing efficient Plutus Core validators.

Cardano components

• cardano-js-sdk: a suite of TypeScript packages suitable for both Node.js and browser-based development.

• cardano-wallet-connector: a tool for connecting DApps to the web wallet and interact with the blockchain.

• cardano-wallet-interface: a Javascript/Typescript library to easily interact with the DApp connector of various wallets.

• cardano-wallet-js: a JavaScript/Typescript SDK for Cardano with several functionalities. It can be used as a client for the official cardano-wallet and also to create native tokens and NFTs.

• cardanocli-js: a library that wraps the cardano-cli with JavaScript and enables faster and more efficient interaction with the cli-commands.

• Cardano DB Sync: one of the core Cardano components. db-sync follows the Cardano chain and takes information both from the chain itself and an internally maintained copy of the ledger state.

• Cardano serialization library: a library for serialization & deserialization of data structures used in Cardano’s Haskell implementation of Shelley, along with useful utility functions.

• Carp (Cardano Postgres Indexer): an indexer that syncs Cardano blockchain information to a Postgres database.

• Testnet (tADA) faucet: the faucet is a web-based service that provides test ada to users of the testnet. While these tokens have no 'real world' value, they enable users to experiment with Cardano testnet features, without having to spend real ada on the mainnet.

This list of tools was originally compiled thanks to the work done by Anita Jovic and Fernando Sanchez. The list is frequently updated with contributions from the Cardano community, and it is provided for informational purposes only. Inclusion does not imply any warranty or endorsement.