Kaspa's EVM Sidekick Finally Shows Up: Igra Mainnet Lands With 'Fashionably Late' Smart Contracts

The Igra Network mainnet is now officially live for the public. It's deploying a decentralized execution layer that's fluent in Ethereum's EVM dialect but ultimately settles its tab on Kaspa's proof-of-work BlockDAG, like a guest who brings their own, much faster, ledger.

This launch follows a six-month beta period, a necessary shakedown for a network built by Igra Labs to address Kaspa's core existential crisis: the glaring lack of smart contracts. It's the classic "all gas, no brakes" scenario—plenty of network activity but nowhere to park your DeFi, leaving potential yield farmers just circling the block.

At the starting line, fifteen protocols are already setting up shop. The early tenants include Kaskad (an Aave-style lending pool), ZealousSwap (a decentralized exchange), and Hyperlane for cross-chain chatter. The initial toolkit is rounded out with wallet services, bridges, and analytics dashboards, forming a basic but functional starter-pack for degens.

Security vetting was outsourced to the blockchain sleuths at Sigma Prime, who apparently signed off with a perfect scorecard and no critical vulnerabilities left in the code—a rarity that’s more impressive than finding a non-toxic Telegram group.

On the roadmap, Igra Labs has scheduled some serious upgrades for 2026, including a new execution engine and infrastructure designed for automated on-chain actions, because what's a layer without plans to eventually scale into the stratosphere?

The project is governed by a Swiss-based association using a decentralized model, because nothing says "credible neutrality" like alpine banking and DAO votes. Circle late March 2026 in your calendar for the public token auction, set to be conducted via an onchain mechanism, giving everyone a fair shot at the paper—or at least a new thing to ape into.