TON glossary

Short definitions of the terms used on apiton.org and in @apitonBot, grouped by topic. The links lead to the guides, the blog and the catalog.

Network and coin

TON: The Open Network, the blockchain that holds Telegram's collectible usernames, anonymous +888 numbers, .ton domains and gifts. The network keeps the name TON; its coin is now called Gram.
Gram (💎): The network's own coin, ticker GRAM, formerly Toncoin (renamed on 15 June 2026, one to one). apiton writes amounts with 💎: “1,250 💎”. Network fees are paid in it, and most prices are set in it.
Nanoton: The smallest unit of the coin: 1 💎 = 1,000,000,000 nanotons. On-chain, balances and prices are whole numbers of nanotons; wallets divide them by 10⁹ to show them. Convert nanotons ↔ 💎.
Workchain: The part of TON an account lives in, and the first number of a raw address: 0 is the basechain, where almost every wallet and contract is; −1 is the masterchain, which holds the network's configuration and validators.
Liteserver: A TON node that answers questions about the current state: balances, get-methods, recent transactions. apiton reads live data from liteservers, not from a third-party index. They keep about a month of transactions; older history comes from an archive.
Get-method: A read-only function of a smart contract that a node runs without a transaction — for example get_last_fill_up_time on a domain or get_sale_data on a sale contract. Running one costs nothing.
TEP: TON Enhancement Proposal, a standard of the network: addresses are TEP-2, NFTs TEP-62, token metadata TEP-64, jettons TEP-74, DNS TEP-81.

Addresses and data

TON address: Identifies an account: a workchain plus a 256-bit account id, the hash of the contract's initial code and data. The same address can be written raw or in user-friendly form. Convert an address · address formats.
Raw address: workchain:hex, for example 0:b774…6ccf. Exact and unambiguous, but without a checksum: a typo gives another valid-looking address.
Bounceable and non-bounceable address: The two user-friendly forms: 48 base64 characters with a flag byte and a CRC16 checksum. EQ… is bounceable — if the message fails, the value comes back; use it for contracts. UQ… is non-bounceable — the value stays even if nothing runs there; use it for wallets. Both are the same account; apiton shows UQ….
Testnet address: A user-friendly address with the testnet flag (0x80): it starts with kQ… or 0Q… and belongs to TON's test network. Mainnet services, apiton included, do not accept it.
Wallet: On TON a wallet is itself a smart contract: it holds coins, NFTs belong to its address, and it sends transfers signed with the owner's key. Wallet contracts come in versions, and one key has a different address in each version.
Seed phrase: The 24 words that restore a wallet's private key. Whoever has them controls the wallet. Never type them into a website, on the ordinary web or on a TON Site.
TON Connect: The protocol a website uses to ask your wallet to sign a transaction. The wallet shows what will be sent and signs it; the website never sees your keys. dns.ton.org and fragment.com work through it.
Cell: TON's basic unit of data: up to 1023 bits and up to 4 references to other cells. Messages, contract code and contract data are all trees of cells.
BOC (bag of cells): The binary serialization of a tree of cells, usually passed around as base64 that starts with te6cc. Decode a BOC.
Hash: A 32-byte SHA-256 fingerprint. Transactions, messages, cells and TON Storage bags are identified by hashes, written as 64 hex characters or 44 base64 characters. Convert hex ↔ base64.
Transaction: One step in the life of an account: it receives a message, runs its code, changes its state and may send new messages. A transfer between two wallets takes at least two transactions, one on each side.
Op-code: The first 32 bits of a message body, telling the contract what to do: 0x0f8a7ea5 is a jetton transfer, 0x5fcc3d14 an NFT transfer, 0 a text comment. The BOC decoder names the common ones.

NFTs and the market

NFT: A unique token on TON (TEP-62): a separate item contract with one owner, usually part of a collection. Collectible usernames, +888 numbers, .ton domains and gifts moved to TON are all NFTs.
Collection: The contract that issues NFT items and keeps their common metadata. Telegram's are “Telegram Usernames” and “Anonymous Telegram Numbers”; .ton domains belong to the TON DNS root collection; each kind of gift has a collection of its own.
Jetton: A fungible token on TON (TEP-74), such as USD₮. It is one jetton master — supply, admin, metadata — plus a separate jetton wallet contract for every holder, which stores that holder's balance. How jettons work.
Sale contract: A marketplace contract that holds an NFT at a fixed price and releases it to whoever pays. While the NFT is listed, its on-chain owner is the contract; apiton shows the seller instead. The price can be in 💎 or in a jetton such as USD₮.
Auction: Usernames and +888 numbers are auctioned inside the NFT itself (Telegram's telemint contracts): each bid must top the last one by at least a set step, a late bid extends the end, and an outbid bid is refunded. .ton domains have their own auction in the DNS item. How the auctions work.
Fragment: Telegram's marketplace at fragment.com. It auctions collectible usernames and +888 numbers and lets owners list them without moving the NFT — apiton marks such prices “per fragment.com”. Gift pictures and metadata come from it too.
Collectible username: A Telegram username sold as an NFT in the “Telegram Usernames” collection; its owner wallet is public. Ordinary usernames, set for free in Telegram's settings, are not on the blockchain. How to check a username.
Anonymous number (+888): A Telegram phone number in the +888 range that belongs to no mobile carrier and exists only as an NFT. Its holder can sign up for or log in to Telegram with it; the login code comes through Fragment instead of an SMS. How to buy one.
Telegram gift: A collectible gift from Telegram, such as Loot Bag #6207. A gift moved to TON is an NFT of its gift collection, with an owner wallet and, when listed, a price; one that has not been moved lives only inside Telegram. Gift collections.

Domains and TON Sites

.ton domain: An NFT in the TON DNS root collection. Its item index is a hash of the name, so a domain can be checked by name but the domains cannot be listed one by one. A domain is valid for a year from its last renewal. How to renew one.
last_fill_up_time: The timestamp of a domain's last renewal, stored in its item. The domain expires 31,622,400 seconds (366 days) later; an owner action that rewrites the item resets it to “now”. A value of 0 means the item was never initialised, not that it expired long ago.
Release auction: What happens to an expired .ton domain: anyone may send it dns_balance_release with at least its minimum price. That starts a one-week auction, each bid at least 5 % higher, and the previous owner loses the domain. Until someone does, the old owner stays recorded. Expired domains.
DNS record: An entry stored in a domain's item and selected by the SHA-256 of its name: wallet (where payments to the name go), site, storage, dns_next_resolver (subdomains). The owner edits them with change_dns_record, which also renews the domain.
site record: The DNS record that turns a domain into a TON Site: it points to the ADNL address of a server or to a TON Storage bag with the site's files.
ADNL: Abstract Datagram Network Layer, TON's peer-to-peer network layer. An ADNL address is the 256-bit id of a server; clients find its current IP address and port through the DHT.
DHT: TON's distributed hash table: the network-wide directory that maps an ADNL address to where the server is now. A TON Site whose server is not in the DHT cannot be reached.
RLDP: Reliable Large Datagram Protocol, TON's reliable transport on top of ADNL over UDP. TON Sites speak ordinary HTTP over RLDP.
TON Storage: TON's file storage, distributed like a torrent: files are grouped in a bag identified by a 256-bit bag id. A TON Site can be served straight from a bag, with no server of its own.
TON Site: A website on a .ton domain served inside the TON network — by an ADNL server over RLDP or from a TON Storage bag. It needs no web host, IP address or certificate, but an ordinary browser needs a TON proxy or a gateway to open it. Live TON Sites · how to open one.
TON proxy: A program on your computer that resolves .ton names and turns RLDP or TON Storage back into plain HTTP for your browser. Tonutils Proxy is one; some wallets have one built in.
Gateway: A server that does a TON proxy's work for any browser. apiton's gateway (site.apiton.org) is behind the View button of live sites: the site opens in a sandbox and sees the gateway, not your IP address.

Guides

Open in @apitonBotcheck any username, number or domain live in Telegram