// the find
decred/atomicswap
On-chain atomic swaps for Decred and other cryptocurrencies.
Command-line tools for performing on-chain atomic swaps between UTXO-based cryptocurrencies (Bitcoin, Litecoin, Decred, and several smaller chains) without a trusted third party. Uses HTLC contracts with timelocked refunds to make the swap atomic — either both sides complete or both can reclaim their funds. Aimed at developers and early adopters who want to understand or experiment with cross-chain swaps at the protocol level.
The README includes a complete worked example with real testnet transactions, contract scripts, and raw hex — you can follow exactly what happened on-chain rather than trusting a diagram. The HTLC design is correct: asymmetric timelocks (48h initiator, 24h participant) prevent the initiator from having a free option to back out after seeing the market move. The 2018 fix enforcing secret size in the contract script is the kind of subtle security detail most toy implementations miss. Each coin gets its own separate binary rather than one omnibus tool, which keeps the per-chain wallet integration code legible.
This is explicitly a proof-of-concept and hasn't moved beyond that in years — the side-channel coordination (copy-pasting hex strings over chat) is entirely manual and there's no sign of that changing. Most supported coins are obscure alts that are barely used; Bitcoin and Litecoin support is there but the tooling requires a locally synced full node with RPC access, which is a high bar for anyone actually wanting to swap. The repo is effectively frozen — last meaningful development was 2018, the project board linked in the README is dead, and most of the 'external support' coins listed are defunct. If you need production atomic swaps today, look at Lightning or more active DEX implementations.