Total Value Locked, a metric used in decentralised finance (DeFi) that measures the aggregate value of crypto assets deposited in a protocol's smart contracts. TVL serves as a proxy for the adoption, trust, and utility of a DeFi platform, with higher TVL generally indicating greater user confidence and deeper liquidity. Analysts track TVL changes to assess protocol health and compare the relative size of competing DeFi platforms.
Example
“Aave's TVL surpassed $12 billion after it launched on a new Layer 2 network, making it the largest lending protocol by total value locked.”