Today I want to share a concept that is quite important in crypto—one that many of you may still be a bit unclear about: what a fork is.

Simply put, a fork is a significant change or divergence in the blockchain protocol. It creates a split point, dividing the blockchain into two separate paths, each following different rules. In plain terms, the blockchain gets split into two independent branches.

There are two main types of forks you need to know. The first is a hard fork—which introduces major changes that are not compatible with the old rules. When a hard fork occurs, it creates a permanent divergence in the blockchain. Nodes or participants that do not upgrade will continue using the old chain, while those who accept the change will switch to the new chain. As a result, you’ll end up with two separate cryptocurrencies, each with its own independent blockchain.

The second is a soft fork—this is quite different. A soft fork is a backward-compatible upgrade. It only introduces changes that are compatible with the current rules, allowing nodes that haven’t upgraded to still validate transactions on the updated blockchain. The key difference is that the blockchain remains a single, unified chain—only upgraded nodes will enforce additional rules.

In summary, what a fork is depends on the type: a hard fork creates a complete split, while a soft fork is just a compatible upgrade. Both are important for the development of blockchain projects.