Introduction

Overview

The Block Protocol (Þ) is an open standard that defines how frontend components called blocks can be built and used.

Block developers can build blocks that work in any application, without knowing anything about the environment in which they'll end up.

Likewise, applications can make their interfaces infinitely extensible without any special knowledge of the blocks that people might develop.

In one sense, you can think of the Block Protocol as a plugin framework for the whole web. Þ blocks are supported in a number of environments today, including the world's most-used content management system,WordPress.

Getting started

The following pages provide a practical introduction for:

• users hoping to use blocks within applications that support the Block Protocol
• developers who want to build blocks and publish them to the Þ Hub
• developers working on applications considering implementing the protocol

Key concepts

We additionally explain core concepts in the Block Protocol, including:

• Blocks: what they actually are, and what makes Þ blocks special
• Types: an overview, how to get started using them, and how they enable next-level modeling of structured content and data
• Services: how external APIs and information are usable within blocks

If you have any questions, please open or contribute to a discussion on GitHub, or chat to us on Discord.

Þ Hub & API

Blocks and types can be published and discovered on the Þ Hub, an open-source registry that anybody can use. There are two ways to access it:

1. in-browser by navigating to blockprotocol.org/hub: no account is required to browse and test blocks
2. programmatically from within other applications: either a user or an embedding application can create a free API key in order to query blocks from the Þ Hub via its API

The Þ Hub exists because interoperability without discoverability is of limited use.** The Þ Hub provides a single persistent, reliable, and open-source point of reference for the discovery of new Þ-compatible content. Creators only need to publish once, while embedding applications can easily discover new blocks, types and services, making them instantly available to their own users.

In addition to blocks and types, we intend to list currently supported services on the Þ Hub soon, and will support directly self-listing new services at a later date.