BCMR on Bitcoin Cash
BCMR gives Bitcoin Cash wallets a shared way to resolve token metadata.
Bitcoin Cash Metadata Registries (BCMR) are an application-layer system for sharing authenticated metadata between BCH software. For CashTokens, registries let wallets and applications associate token categories with human-readable information for display and discovery.
Specification status: draft application-layer standard.
Educational overview. Client behavior can vary.
What BCMR contributes
Metadata is part of the token experience.
A category identifies a CashToken, but people need more context than a long identifier. BCMR gives wallets and applications a structured way to resolve useful information without putting every display field directly into each transaction.
On-chain reference
Use the category ID as the protocol-level reference for tokens belonging to that category.
Display fields
Names, symbols, decimals, and descriptions help a wallet explain what a user holds.
Media and links
Icons and resource URIs can connect a token entry to a richer product experience.
Resolution behavior
Clients need validation, caching, and fallback behavior when a registry document is unavailable.
Metadata resolution
The client connects an on-chain category to a usable display.
Wallets and indexers are responsible for the resolution path. A resilient implementation treats registry data as external input: it validates what it can, handles unavailable data, and never confuses a display label with the asset reference itself.
A token-bearing output provides the category that identifies the asset on-chain.
A wallet or indexer can obtain metadata from an embedded, imported, DNS-resolved, or chain-resolved BCMR source.
Validate the registry according to its resolution method, verify published content hashes where applicable, and cache metadata using an explicit update policy.
The application shows the metadata when available and falls back to the category when it is not.
BCMR in the product stack
Every layer has a different responsibility.
Issuance
Choose the token category and the metadata publication strategy the product intends to use.
Registry
Publish a discoverable document that clients can resolve and validate.
Indexer
Associate token-bearing UTXOs with balances, holders, and metadata for application queries.
Wallet
Turn the resolved data into a clear asset list, history, and transaction preview.
Important boundary
Metadata is not consensus state.
BCMR can make a token understandable, but it does not change whether a BCH transaction is valid. Applications should keep the on-chain category authoritative and treat names, icons, and descriptions as resolved data with explicit fallback behavior.
Metadata cannot make an otherwise invalid transaction valid.
Wallets should remain useful when a document, image, or registry endpoint cannot be reached.
Clients should define which registries or resolution methods they trust, how updates are authenticated, when cached data expires, and how the interface falls back when metadata is unavailable.
Continue the technical path
Move from metadata to the CashToken primitive, infrastructure, wallet behavior, or implementation resources.
Related reading
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