A Deep Dive into the Lit Protocol Ecosystem. An overview of the core use cases and projects powered by decentralized keys👇

Lit Protocol is a foundational decentralized network for signing and encryption that’s powered by threshold cryptography, secure hardware, and blockchain technology. Currently securing more than $422M in assets under decentralized management (AUDM), Lit Protocol is a leading infrastructure provider for all of crypto, AI, and beyond.

Most applications need one of two things to work: 1. A signature to take action (send a transaction, authorize an API call, approve an agent to execute something). 2. Encryption to secure data and control who has the ability to access it. Today, both are usually handled through centralized custodians or locally stored private keys, which makes automation risky, cross-chain workflows clunky, and managing access to sensitive data vulnerable to exploitation.

Lit replaces traditional key and secret management with a decentralized network that signs and decrypts based on programs that run within the network, rather than exposing keys or secrets directly. That core function — programmable signing and encryption — has become the backbone of a growing number of live products using Lit Protocol in production.

1. Wallets and Smart Signers: Lit Protocol enables developers to build programmable, non-custodial wallets and signers that can execute transactions on virtually any blockchain while simplifying custody flows and simultaneously making them more secure. Ecosystem examples include @Collab_Land_, @thehumnwallet, @PluralityWeb3, @zerodev_app, and @payy_link, among others.

2. Cross-Chain Liquidity and Interoperability Numerous protocols and applications rely on Lit to coordinate cross-chain transactions through programmable, policy-based signatures. By abstracting the underlying key material and allowing transaction execution to occur conditionally, developers can build systems that operate seamlessly across any blockchain including @ethereum, @solana , @Bitcoin , and beyond. Examples from the ecosystem include @EmblemVault, @eco, @useTria, @GeniusTerminal, @Polaris_App, @VaultLayer, @gvnrdao, and others.

3. Agent Workflows In order for AI agents to act on our behalf — executing transactions, retrieving data, or managing our assets — there needs to be verifiable guardrails in place to enforce what agents can and can’t do. Lit provides the foundation for that trust by letting agents perform operations under fine-grained, user-defined conditions without ever exposing keys or other sensitive data to the agent directly. Examples of projects building and collaborating in this category include @AgentHustleAI, @elizaOSc, @virtuals_io, @Gaianet_AI, @onbonsai, @Dexfinapp, and more.

4. Data Encryption and Access Control Lit extends beyond signing and wallet management to enable privacy-preserving collaboration and secure data management. Builders can use Lit for data encryption where access is enforced through flexible “Access Control Conditions” (ACCs), dictating exactly who, when, or under what conditions data access should be granted. Teams leveraging Lit within this capacity include @Molecule_dao, @LC, @Humanityprot, @terminal3io, @cheqd_io, @Streamr, @indexnetwork_, @0xHolonym, @storachanetwork, @RequestNetwork, @irys_xyz, @AlexandriaLabs, and countless others.

What unites all of these teams is simple: They needed automation, account, or access management without surrendering control over keys or data. If you’re building in any of the categories above — or you’re building something that should be automated but can’t be without introducing additional trust assumptions, unlock decentralization with Lit Protocol.