All terms
A waiting period before any vested tokens unlock at all.
A cliff is the initial period during which nothing is released. A one year cliff with three year vesting means nothing unlocks for twelve months, then the schedule begins. It is borrowed directly from employee equity.
The cliff date is worth having in your calendar for anything you hold. It is the moment a group of holders who paid nothing, or almost nothing, can sell for the first time, and markets frequently price that in advance rather than on the day.
A cliff is a promise about timing, not about behavior. It tells you when selling becomes possible, not whether it will happen.
A token where the first team unlock arrives twelve months after launch, visible on the vesting contract from day one.
That a cliff protects the price. It delays the first release and concentrates it: nothing unlocks for months, then a large tranche arrives at once. A cliff date is a date worth having in your calendar.
Common questions
What happens at the end of a cliff?
Why do projects use a cliff?
Where this comes up on the site
The guides that actually use this word, rather than a list of everything we have written.
Where to go next
More trading terms
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