ERCs

ERCs, or Ethereum Request for Comments, are a formal subset of the Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) process used to develop and publish technical standards for the Ethereum ecosystem. An ERC defines a commonly used interface, protocol, or behavior that is intended to be implemented by smart contracts, wallets, exchanges, and other on-chain software. They are community-driven and focus on interoperability and shared expectations for how components should interact.

Proposals are drafted and discussed in public forums and the EIPs repository. When a proposal gains sufficient consensus and passes review, it is assigned an ERC number and published as an ERC standard. Adoption of an ERC is voluntary, but widespread implementation by wallet providers, DeFi protocols, and other tools helps ensure compatibility across the ecosystem.

Common ERCs include ERC-20, for fungible tokens; ERC-721, for non-fungible tokens; and ERC-1155, for multi-token standards. These standards specify the required functions, events, and sometimes optional features that enable predictable token balances, transfers, approvals, and metadata handling. Such uniform interfaces allow different contracts and services to interact with tokens in a reliable way, facilitating use cases in wallets, exchanges, and decentralized applications.

Impact and governance: ERCs promote interoperability and reduce fragmentation, but not every proposal achieves broad adoption. Changes to a standard may be debated, revised, or deprecated as the ecosystem evolves. The ERC process emphasizes openness, broad community review, and iterative improvement within the Ethereum ecosystem.