Governance on Onyx Chain
How native on-chain governance works on Onyx Chain — stake-to-vote with stXCN, Onyx Improvement Proposals (OIPs), and Timelock-protected execution.
Onyx Chain has its own native, fully on-chain governance system. Holders who stake XCN receive stXCN, and that staked position is what gives them the power to create proposals and vote on them directly on Onyx Chain (chain ID 327). Approved proposals are executed on-chain by a Timelock contract — no multisig or manual admin action is involved in carrying out an approved decision.
Proposals on Onyx Chain are catalogued as Onyx Improvement Proposals (OIPs): OIP-1, OIP-2, and so on. An OIP number is a permanent identifier assigned when the proposal is created on-chain.
Two governance domains. Onyx governance exists on two chains, and they are deliberately separate:
Ethereum governance — the original Onyx Governor on Ethereum, controlled by XCN stakers on Ethereum. See the Governance Overview.
Onyx Chain governance — the native system described in this section, controlled by stXCN stakers on Onyx Chain.
A proposal lives entirely on one chain. There is no cross-chain proposal, and XCN staked on one chain never counts as voting power on the other.
Stake-to-vote
The single most important rule of Onyx Chain governance:
Only staked XCN votes. Voting power comes exclusively from stXCN — unstaked ("liquid") XCN held in a wallet on Onyx Chain has zero voting power.
To participate, you first stake XCN through the Onyx App and receive stXCN. Your voting weight equals your stXCN balance — including accrued staking rewards — measured at a snapshot block. See Voting Power and Snapshots for exactly how and when your weight is measured.
How a proposal flows
Stake — XCN holders stake and hold stXCN.
Snapshot — voting power for the proposal is fixed at a published, verifiable snapshot block.
Propose — a staker whose snapshot weight meets the proposal threshold creates the OIP on-chain, including the exact actions to execute.
Vote — after a 1-day delay, voting opens for 2 days. Voters cast For, Against, or Abstain.
Timelock — an approved proposal is queued into the Timelock for a mandatory 2-day delay, giving the community time to review before anything changes.
Execute — after the delay, anyone can trigger execution. The Timelock performs the proposal's actions exactly as they were voted on.
The full journey from proposal creation to execution takes a minimum of about 5 days (1-day voting delay + 2-day voting period + 2-day timelock delay). Every stage is covered step by step in the Proposal Lifecycle.
Key parameters
Voting asset
stXCN (staked XCN) only
Proposal threshold
max(100,000,000 XCN, 0.10% of eligible staked supply), capped at 1,000,000,000 — currently 100,000,000 staked XCN of snapshot weight
Voting delay
1 day after proposal creation
Voting period
2 days
Vote options
For / Against / Abstain
Quorum
max(200,000,000 XCN, 2.00% of eligible staked supply), capped at 1,000,000,000 — currently 200,000,000; only For votes count toward quorum
Pass condition
For votes ≥ quorum and For > Against
Timelock delay
2 days before execution
Snapshot challenge window
1 day before a snapshot becomes usable
These parameters mirror the thresholds long used by Onyx governance on Ethereum (100M proposal threshold, 200M quorum), so voters moving between the two domains see familiar rules.
What you can do as a...
Voter
Any amount of stXCN at the snapshot
Vote For / Against / Abstain on any active OIP
Proposer
≥ proposal threshold in stXCN snapshot weight
Create an OIP with concrete on-chain actions
Rollout status. Onyx Chain governance is activating in stages. The contracts described in this section are deployed on Onyx Mainnet, and proposal creation and voting open in the Onyx App once the first eligibility snapshot is finalized. Until activation completes, active governance voting continues through Ethereum governance.
In this section
Proposal Lifecycle — every stage of an OIP, from draft to execution, and what a voter does at each one.
Voting Power and Snapshots — how stXCN becomes voting weight, how snapshots are published and verified, and the rules to keep your vote eligible.
Governance Contracts — the Governor, Timelock, Snapshot Registry, and Grant Treasury contracts, with addresses and architecture diagrams.
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