FA2 (TZIP-12)

Smart Contract Standard

Financial Application 2 (TZIP-12): Tezos' unified multi-asset token interface standard supporting fungible tokens, NFTs, and semi-fungible tokens within a single contract. Defines a flexible, permission-configurable token interface with configurable transfer policies (monolith, transfer hook, or wrapper patterns). Equivalent in scope to ERC-20 + ERC-721 + ERC-1155 combined. The dominant token standard for the Tezos ecosystem.

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Details

License https://gitlab.com/tezos/tzip/-/blob/master/proposals/tzip-12/tzip-12.md
Dev Status 🏁 Final
Dev Status Detail Final (active production standard)
Owner Tezos ecosystem / TQ Tezos (original proposal); maintained by Tezos Foundation and community
Governing Body Tezos Foundation (TZIP process; original proposal by TQ Tezos)
Country Switzerland (Tezos Foundation)
Start Year 2020
Stack Michelson (Tezos native VM); high-level implementations in SmartPy (Python DSL) and LIGO (Pascal/CameLIGO/ReasonLIGO); compiles to Michelson bytecode
Funding Tezos Foundation grants; TQ Tezos (commercial ecosystem development); community contributions
Last Investigated Mar 9, 2026

Use Case Domains

Platform Evolution & Sovereignty

Affordances

Transparent stewardship Interoperable formats

Smart Contract Standard Attributes

Origins Developed by TQ Tezos (now Tezos Foundation ecosystem arm) in 2020, following FA1.2 (TZIP-7, fungible-only) and building on ERC-1155 inspiration. Motivated by the need for a single unified interface handling all token types, replacing the fragmented ERC-20/ERC-721 split. Initial interface specification written in CameLIGO; reference implementations subsequently provided in SmartPy and LIGO. FA2.1 (TZIP-26) is an active draft extending FA2 with events, on-chain views, and tickets.
Data Formats transfer batch: list of {from_, list of {to_, token_id, amount}}; balance_of query/response; update_operators; token metadata: key-value big_map (TZIP-16 compliant); token_id: nat; Michelson pair/list encoding
Terms MIT
Funds Unknown
Based On FA1.2 / TZIP-7 (predecessor fungible standard); ERC-1155 (multi-token design inspiration); TZIP-16 (Tezos contract metadata standard)
Permissions Configurable permission policies: self-transfer, operator-approved transfer, no-transfer; operator model for delegated transfers; mint/burn entry points not standardized (implementer discretion)
Development Tools SmartPy IDE (https://smartpy.io); LIGO (https://ligolang.org); Taquito (JavaScript client library); Tezos CLI (octez-client); Temple Wallet; Better Call Dev (contract explorer)
Protocol Maturity / Standardization Final TZIP; dominant Tezos token standard adopted by all major wallets, DEXes, and NFT platforms on Tezos (objkt.com, fx(hash), Versum); FA2.1 draft extends the standard
Trust Framework Trustless: Michelson contract logic enforces transfer permissions; on-chain operator registry; no admin key in base standard; trust model governed by Tezos liquid proof-of-stake consensus and Michelson formal verification tools
Target Application Domain Fungible tokens; NFTs and digital art (major Tezos NFT ecosystem); semi-fungible tokens; regulated asset tokenization (DAR-1 standard built on FA2); civic and social tokens; DAO governance tokens
Deployment Model Per-project contract origination on Tezos; single contract supports all token types and multiple token IDs; optional multi-asset architecture
Standard Type Token Standard
Ecosystem Tezos