Grayscale GADA decision
Deadline ≈ Oct 23, 2026The 75-day streamlined review from August 9. Approve, deny, or extend into 2027 — all three remain possible, and eligibility has never meant inevitability.
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Cardano Timeline
Every era, upgrade, market shock, regulatory turn and governance milestone in ADA's life — 36 events, 32 of them stamped with the price at the time and what price did over the following 7 and 30 days. Plus everything on the calendar ahead.
Curated + web-verified through 2026-08-28 · price coupling: Coinbase daily, Kraken weekly · daily resolution from 2021-03-18
What price did next is a fact. Why is not. Each event shows ADA's price then and the following 7- and 30-day change. That is sequence, not cause — prices move for a thousand reasons at once, and several events below landed mid-crash or mid-mania that had nothing to do with them. Read the reactions as context, never as “this upgrade did this.”
Ahead
targets and deadlines, not promises — roadmaps slipDijkstra hard fork, phase one
Target Q4 2026Protocol v12: a new ledger era shipping Nested Transactions and Linear Leios — endorser blocks certified by a stake-based committee to lift throughput.
Ouroboros Peras
Target Q2 2027Faster settlement finality, arriving as Dijkstra phase two via an intra-era fork once phase one lays the ledger groundwork.
Leios capacity ramp
Phased after enablementAdversarial testing, red-team exercises and load testing continue through Q4 2026; throughput targets unlock in stages, not on one switch-flip day.
Midnight & the NIGHT drop
Rolling outThe privacy partner-chain and its token distribution to ADA holders; spring coverage targeted a Q2 2026 mainnet — check midnight.network for the current phase.
The wider ETF queue
Behind the same frameworkVanEck, Bitwise, 21Shares and Canary filings queue behind Grayscale under the generic listing standards.
36 of 36 events
20265 events
2026-08-09Regulatory
Spot-ETF eligibility day
The six-month CME futures clock completes. Eligibility is not approval — the Grayscale decision window runs to late October.
ADA then $0.1944next 7d -10%next 30d +13%
2026-07-18Protocol
van Rossem — Protocol v11
Cheaper Plutus execution and Leios groundwork — and the first hard fork proposed, debated and ratified entirely on-chain. Named for governance contributor Max van Rossem.
ADA then $0.1667next 7d -1%next 30d +4%
2026-06Protocol
Leios public testnet opens
The throughput redesign goes public; simulations point to hundreds of TPS.
ADA then $0.2308next 7d -26%next 30d -33%
2026-04Market
First US ADA futures ETFs
Futures-based products (CRDD, CRDX) bring the first regulated US ADA exposure.
ADA then $0.2483next 7d +1%next 30d -0%
2026-02-09Regulatory
CME lists ADA futures
Regulated futures begin trading — starting the SEC's six-month clock toward spot-ETF eligibility.
ADA then $0.2698next 7d +6%next 30d -3%
20255 events
2025-08Regulatory
Grayscale files GADA
S-1 filed for a spot Cardano ETF on NYSE Arca; VanEck, Bitwise, 21Shares and Canary file or signal intent.
ADA then $0.7139next 7d +11%next 30d +14%
2025-03-02Regulatory
ADA named in US reserve proposal
A presidential post floats ADA for a US strategic crypto reserve; ADA spikes double digits within hours.
ADA then $1.14next 7d -36%next 30d -40%
2025-02Regulatory
SEC drops the Coinbase case
The suit that named ADA a security is dismissed; the Binance case follows in May.
ADA then $0.7811next 7d -1%next 30d -8%
2025-02Governance
Constitution ratified on-chain
The community votes the Constitution into force — overwhelmingly.
ADA then $0.8946next 7d -22%next 30d -4%
2025-01-29Governance
Plomin — full on-chain governance
DReps, SPOs and the Constitutional Committee take the wheel. Voltaire, complete.
ADA then $0.94next 7d -22%next 30d -33%
20243 events
2024-12-04Governance
Constitutional Convention
Delegates in Buenos Aires and Nairobi finalise the draft Cardano Constitution.
ADA then $1.19next 7d -9%next 30d -8%
2024-11-05Market
US election repricing
A pro-crypto sweep sets off a market-wide run; ADA multiplies into December.
ADA then $0.3335next 7d +71%next 30d +248%
2024-09-01Governance
Chang — governance bootstrap
The Conway era opens: the first hard fork of the Voltaire age hands constitutional power toward the community.
ADA then $0.3311next 7d +2%next 30d +6%
20235 events
2023-07Protocol
Mithril reaches mainnet
Stake-based snapshot certification — fast, verified node bootstrapping.
ADA then $0.2925next 7d -1%next 30d +5%
2023-06-05Regulatory
SEC names ADA a security
The Binance suit (Coinbase's follows a day later) lists ADA among alleged securities. US exchanges wobble; the cloud hangs for 20 months.
ADA then $0.3516next 7d -22%next 30d -19%
2023-05-11Protocol
Hydra Head v1 on mainnet
The first production release of Cardano's layer-2 scaling protocol.
ADA then $0.3602next 7d +3%next 30d -24%
2023-02-14Protocol
Valentine — SECP support
Cross-chain signature verification (SECP256k1) arrives in an intra-era upgrade.
ADA then $0.387next 7d +1%next 30d -16%
2023-01-31Ecosystem
Djed stablecoin launches
Cardano's overcollateralised stablecoin goes to mainnet.
ADA then $0.3902next 7d +2%next 30d -10%
20225 events
2022-11-08Market
FTX halts withdrawals
The exchange collapse that defined the cycle low era for the whole market.
ADA then $0.3723next 7d -10%next 30d -16%
2022-09-22Protocol
Vasil — throughput upgrade
Pipelining and reference inputs land, named for the late community member Vasil Dabov.
ADA then $0.4583next 7d -4%next 30d -23%
2022-05-09Market
Terra/LUNA collapses
A $40B ecosystem implodes in a week and repricing rips across every altcoin.
ADA then $0.6018next 7d -8%next 30d +6%
2022-05-05Marketcomputed from data
Worst week ever — -43%
The largest single-week fall in ADA's history. Computed from the data.
ADA then $0.7884next 7d -40%next 30d -28%
2022-01-20Ecosystem
SundaeSwap launches
Cardano's first major DEX opens; day-one congestion becomes a stress test in public.
ADA then $1.26next 7d -17%next 30d -21%
20215 events
2021-09-12Protocol
Alonzo — smart contracts
Plutus goes live ten days after the all-time high. The sell-the-news chapter in most retellings.
ADA then $2.58next 7d -12%next 30d -18%
2021-08-26Marketcomputed from data
All-time high — $2.87
Highest weekly close on record (intraday ran a little higher). Computed from the data, not curated.
ADA then $2.53next 7d +17%next 30d -9%
2021-03-16Market
Coinbase lists ADA
US retail access arrives; the listing this site's daily price history starts from.
ADA then $1.23next 7d -9%next 30d +20%
2021-03-01Protocol
Mary — native tokens
Assets become first-class citizens, no contracts needed. The fork every Cardano token — including memecoins — exists because of.
ADA then $1.13next 7d +22%next 30d +4%weekly closes
2021-02-04Marketcomputed from data
Best week ever — +113%
The largest single-week gain in ADA's history. Computed from the data.
ADA then $0.9416next 7d -5%next 30d +20%weekly closes
20203 events
2020-07-29Protocol
Shelley — staking goes live
The network decentralises: delegation and stake pools on mainnet. Cardano's defining feature ships.
ADA then $0.1424next 7d -4%next 30d -19%weekly closes
2020-03-12Market
COVID Black Thursday
Crypto-wide liquidation cascade; bitcoin nearly halves in a day and ADA is dragged with it.
ADA then $0.0261next 7d +13%next 30d +22%weekly closes
2020-03-12Marketcomputed from data
All-time low — $0.0261
Lowest weekly close since listing. Computed from the data.
ADA then $0.0261next 7d +13%next 30d +22%weekly closes
20191 event
2019-11-29Protocol
Incentivized Testnet snapshot
Balances snapshotted for the ITN — the community's dress rehearsal for real staking.
ADA then $0.0372next 7d -1%next 30d -10%weekly closes
20181 event
2018-01-04Market
Cycle-one mania peak
ADA touches roughly $1.30 intraday in the 2017–18 altcoin blow-off, then spends years unwinding it.
price data unavailable for this date this refresh
20172 events
2017-10-01Market
ADA begins trading
First exchange listings. Everything on this page after this line has a price.
price data unavailable for this date this refresh
2017-09-29Protocol
Byron — mainnet launches
Cardano's first era goes live: a federated settlement layer running Ouroboros.
before ADA traded — no price to couple
20151 event
2015-09Market
The ICO era begins
ADA voucher sales run 2015–2017, raising roughly $62M, largely in Japan. A 2026 audit found 99.7% of vouchers successfully redeemed.
before ADA traded — no price to couple
What “everything” means here. Every protocol era and named upgrade, the market shocks that moved ADA, the full regulatory arc from lawsuit to ETF clock, governance from convention to constitution, and ecosystem firsts — plus four entries no one curated: the all-time high, the all-time low, and the best and worst weeks ever, computed from the price series itself so their dates and numbers are exact. Not every version bump or partnership press release; a list that includes everything includes nothing. Adding an event is one line in
lib/cardano-timeline.ts.Resolution and boundaries. Events from March 2021 onward get daily price resolution; earlier ones use weekly closes and say so. Month-precision dates (where only the month is certain) couple to that month's start. Items after January 2026 were verified by web search on 2026-08-28 against CoinDesk, Intersect, IOG and other primary coverage. The Ahead section lists targets and deadlines as stated by their owners — crypto roadmaps slip, and this page will say so when they do.
Information only, not investment advice.