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 according to categories:

NFT creation tools

• Cardano Sounds: a platform aiming 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: a marketplace for Cardano non-fungible tokens.

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

• Kreate Platform: a creator-first platform, making Web3 accessible to indie artists from all over! Focused on creating, this platform aims to get your art out there to new fans.

• NFT-MACHINE: an NFT minting platform.

• NEWM-artist-portal: the artist portal for users to upload their music and fractionalized ownership with NFTs.

• NMKR: create, manage, and sell NFTs with NMKR.io. NMKR offers backend tools and services for brands, companies, and creators to help them build white-label NFT solutions.

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

• Pix: a CLI for managing NFT projects.

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

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

Smart contract platforms

• Aiken: Cardano smart contract platform providing an easy-to-learn functional programming language, a modern development environment, and an optimized toolkit for working with Plutus.

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

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

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

• OpShin: a simple Python programming language for smart contracts on Cardano.

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

• Plu-ts: Typescript-embedded smart contract programming language and transaction creation library.

• Scalus: Scala 3 implementation of Cardano Plutus Platform. Scala to Plutus compiler and a library to construct and evaluate Untyped Plutus Core programs. Works on JVM and JavaScript platforms.

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

• .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.

• Automint: a Python library for programmatic access to cardano-cli functions to facilitate transactions.

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

• Cardano-CLI: the associated command-line interface for interacting with a Cardano node, managing addresses, or generating transactions.

• 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 the Cardano blockchain from a Java application.

• Cardano Crystal SDK: a Crystal SDK for the Blockfrost.io API.

• Cardano Multiplatform Lib: a collection of tools and codecs for encoding/decoding fundamental data structures, intended to replace 'cardano-serialization-lib'.

• Cardano Sharp: CardanoSharp.Wallet is a Cardano cryptographic and serialization library for .NET applications.

• Demeter.run: a cloud-based platform equipped with all the necessary resources for constructing decentralized applications (DApps).

• Go-Cardano-Serialization: Golang library for serialization & deserialization of Cardano data structures.

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

• Kogmios: a Kotlin API library for interacting with Ogmios.

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

• Liqwid-libs: a monorepo for Liqwid Labs Plutarch libraries.

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

• Maestro Dapp Platform: blockchain indexer, APIs, and event management system for the Cardano blockchain.

• Mesh SDK: an open-source library providing numerous tools to easily build powerful DApps on the Cardano blockchain.

• Ogmios: a lightweight bridge interface for cardano-node, which offers a WebSockets API enabling local clients to speak Ouroboros' mini-protocols via JSON/RPC.

• Open CNFT Public Rest API: the OpenCNFT Cardano NFT REST-based API that allows access to a wealth of NFT metadata including ownership, activity, and transaction details in real-time. 

• Pallas: an expanding collection of modules that re-implements common Ouroboros / Cardano logic in native Rust. This packaging 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.

• 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.

• StricaHQ Typhonjs Wallet: a pure JavaScript library for Cardano wallets.

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

Data services, blockchain integration, automation

• Cardano metadata oracle: this repository contains the code and configuration files of the metadata oracle for Cardano.

• Fluree: the full spectrum of data management tooling for data-centric organizations – from the first step of integrating and migrating legacy system data infrastructure through to building modernized operational and analytical data infrastructure. 

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

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

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

• Scrolls: a tool to build and maintain read-optimized collections of Cardano's on-chain entities. The tool 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.

• TapTools: a token, NFT, and wallet tracking platform.

Native tokens

• 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.

Open source, developer tools, decentralized protocols, enterprise apps

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

• Atlas: an application backend for Plutus smart contracts on Cardano.

• Cardano-kit-crystal: a toolkit for Crystal to ease development for the Cardano blockchain.

• Cardano e2e example: a simple Cardano DApp example.

• Cardano stack Exchange: Cardano Stack Exchange is a question-and-answer site for users and developers of the Cardano cryptocurrency ecosystem.

• Clarity Protocol: the Clarity Protocol provides a platform to create and manage DAOs with no code.

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

• Go-ouroboros-network: a Go implementation of the Cardano Ouroboros protocol.

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

• Koios-api-python: a Python package for the Cardano Blockchain Koios API.

• Koios Java Client: a Decentralized and Elastic RESTful query layer for exploring data on the Cardano blockchain to consume within applications/wallets/explorers/etc.

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

• UTxO selection benchmark: a library that can be used to compare the algorithms: how they behave, how they affect the fees, and what will be the final UTXO sets.

• Wallet OneBox: provides a single cohesive tool that one can use to set up downstream indexers and RPC services required to support common endpoints needed to run a wallet.

• WingRiders/CAB Cardano Application Backend: a library to help with the development of Cardano apps for browser and Node.js.

Stake pool tooling

• AdaPools: the blockchain explorer with the support of all testnet instances and an API.

• 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.

• Dotare - Cardano delegation: a delegation function that uses CIP-30 to improve the quality of life for developers and delegators.

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

• StakePool Operator Scripts (SPOS): learn how to create and manage your stake pool with these simple scripts.

Plutus-specific tools

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

• 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 fee estimator: a tool to estimate transaction fees (eg, 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 (ie, 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: JavaScript SDK for interacting with Cardano, providing various key management options, with support for popular hardware wallets.

• cardano-wallet-connector: a tool to connect DApps to the web wallet and interact with the blockchain using the latest cardano-serialization-lib.

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

• 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): a modular indexer that syncs Cardano blockchain information to a SQL Postgres database backend.

• 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.

The original list of tools was compiled thanks to the work done by Anita Jovic, Olga Hryniuk, and Fernando Sanchez. The list is provided for informational purposes only. Inclusion does not imply any warranty or endorsement.

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