Document history
Changelog
Version history of this documentation. The BRC-20 protocol itself is maintained upstream; protocol milestones are listed separately below for context.
Documentation versions
1.0.0 · 2026-09-01
First complete documentation release. The site was previously a single narrative page; this version rebuilds it as a full protocol dossier.
- Added the normative specification: payload format, deploy, mint and transfer field tables, and validity rules R1 to R24 with individually linkable anchors.
- Added the guide with worked deploy, mint, and two-phase transfer examples, and a support matrix limited to capabilities verified in Bitcoin Universe code.
- Added the reference: terminology, confirmation, mempool and reorg semantics, the cursed inscriptions caveat, fee and size considerations, limitations, security considerations, and a 16-point implementation checklist.
- Added test vectors: 6 valid and 14 invalid payload vectors, plus 5 ledger state vectors covering first-is-valid, the mint remainder rule, the three first-spend outcomes, permanent voiding, and reorg reversal.
- Added the client-side payload validator.
- Added local search, an accessible ledger-typographic design in light and dark themes,
llms.txt,sitemap.xml,robots.txt, a helpful 404 page, and adocs.manifest.jsonfor the documentation platform. - Replaced remotely hosted images and icons with self-contained assets, so the site loads no third-party resources.
- Restated BRC-20's origin with domo explicitly, and marked every Bitcoin Universe indexing decision as Universe-specific rather than protocol rule.
0.1.0 · 2026-08-12
Initial single-page site: a narrative introduction to deploy, mint, and transfer, with visual credit to the original BRC-20 documentation. The factual content of that page (the three operations, the two-phase transfer, and the pre-signing checks) is carried forward into this release.
Protocol milestones
Context for readers, not a record of changes to this document.
| Date | Milestone |
|---|---|
| 2023-03-08 | domo publishes the BRC-20 experiment and inscribes the first deploy, ordi, with an explicit warning that the tokens would be worthless. |
| 2023 | Wide ecosystem adoption; indexers converge on a shared reading of the rules, with the two-phase transfer and first-is-valid as the load-bearing behaviors. |
| 2023 onward | The indexing rules move to maintained publication by the Layer1 Foundation; OPI becomes the open reference implementation. |
| Later | The self-issuance extension admits 5-byte tickers deployed with "self_mint":"true". |
| Later | Programmable extensions are proposed on top of the classic operations. They are out of scope for this specification and are not represented in the Bitcoin Universe read model. |
For the authoritative upstream record see the original documentation and the Layer1 Foundation indexing rules.
Versioning policy
- Major: a change to a numbered rule's meaning, or a restructuring that breaks existing anchors.
- Minor: new pages, new rules, or new vectors that do not change existing rule meanings.
- Patch: corrections, clarifications, and link fixes.
Rule numbers R1 to R24 are stable identifiers. A rule that is withdrawn keeps its number and is marked withdrawn rather than being reused.