Centralized applications, commonly known simply as “apps,” are owned and operated by a specific company. The application software for the app is stored on servers controlled by the company. People worldwide use apps every day on their phones. They use Uber, Lyft, Grab, etc., to catch a ride, UberEats or DoorDash to order food to their home, and many more. Most businesses nowadays have apps. Many banks have apps that enable customers to complete banking transactions and transfers and even order a new credit card.
Gone are the days when we must go to a physical location for everything. Now, it’s as simple as opening an app on a mobile phone. Apps have made life much more convenient for many people, but it has come at a cost. Many apps collect their users’ personal data. Some even sell that personal data to other third-party apps to generate additional profits.
However, decentralized apps (dapps) are, as their name suggests, decentralized, meaning that a central company does not control them. The fact that they are decentralized eliminates many of the negative aspects of centralized apps.
What Are DApps, And How Are They Different From Apps?
Decentralized applications (DApps) are digital applications that run on a blockchain. The blockchains they are built on are decentralized networks. A dapp combines a smart contract with a frontend user interface. The big difference between dapps and apps is that a dapp has its backend code running on a decentralized peer-to-peer blockchain network. In contrast, an app’s backend code runs on a centralized server or multiple centralized servers.
DApps provide many benefits, including privacy. To interact with a dapp, you don’t need to provide information about your identity like you often do for apps. Your data is safe on a dapp since data stored on blockchains is unchangeable.
DApps run in an open-source environment and cannot be controlled or interfered with by any single authority.
Why Do People Choose To Build DApps?
DApps originally appeared on the Ethereum blockchain. Part of the appeal of building a dapp on top of an existing blockchain, such as the Ethereum blockchain, is that the dapp developers don’t need to develop their own blockchain.
Choosing to run on top of an existing blockchain network has some advantages. Networks that have existed for longer, like the Ethereum Network, have proven that they can last and have a more substantial influence on the blockchain space.
This can give new dapp projects that are just starting a boost and help them benefit from being attached to a more well-known and established project.
Many dapps have become highly successful and influential in the blockchain space themselves. Some popular Ethereum dapps are Uniswap, Opensea, and 0x Protocol.
As smart contracts become more prevalent in the blockchain space, dapps have become even more common, and blockchain networks that host dapps have continued to grow into real ecosystems.
What dapps do you use? In your experience, which dapps do you find the most useful?
