What are Decentralized Applications (Dapps)?

In the context of Ethereum, Dapps are interfaces that interact with the blockchain through the use of smart contracts. From the front, Dapps look and behave like regular web and mobile applications, except that they interact with a blockchain and in different ways. Some of the ways include requiring ETH to use the Dapp, storage of user data onto blockchain such that it is immutable, and so on.

What are the benefits of Dapps?

Dapps are built on top of decentralized blockchain networks such as Ethereum and usually have the following benefits:

• Immutability: Nobody can change any information once it’s on the blockchain.
• Tamper-proof: Smart contracts published onto the blockchain cannot be tampered with without alerting every other participant on the blockchain.
• Transparent: Smart contracts powering Dapps are openly auditable.
• Availability: As long as the Ethereum network remains active, Dapps built on it will remain active and usable.

What are the disadvantages of Dapps?

While a blockchain offers many benefits, there are also many different downsides that come along with it:

• Immutability: Smart contracts are written by humans and can only be as good as the person who wrote it. Human errors are unavoidable and immutable smart contracts have the potential to compound errors into something larger.
• Transparent: Openly auditable smart contracts can also become attack vectors for hackers as they can view the code to find exploits.
• Scalability: In most cases, the bandwidth of a Dapp is limited to the blockchain it resides on. 

Original article is taken from Coingecko's book "How to DeFi"

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