Smart Contract Audit Services

Sherlock provides comprehensive smart contract security review through multiple audit methodologies tailored to protocol needs. The platform assembles teams of top-ranked Web3 security experts from an 11,000+ researcher network to conduct thorough vulnerability assessments before deployment.

Collaborative Audits

Sherlock's collaborative audit model matches specialists to specific protocol architectures through data-driven team assembly. Every auditor is ranked by verified accuracy, impact, and specialization, with predictive modeling used to match senior Watsons and domain experts to each codebase under review. The audit process employs actuarial design leveraging performance metrics, code complexity analysis, and historical patterns to shape the review methodology.

The merit-based incentive model ensures network access and researcher earnings follow performance, creating a competitive environment that surfaces the most capable security experts. This produces stronger audit results compared to traditional single-team approaches, with outcomes including critical path uncovery, structural weakness identification, attack surface mapping, and high-impact finding validation.

Audit Contests

Audit contests apply broad competitive pressure through parallel testing by hundreds of independent researchers. The process begins with scope setup and a comprehensive review pass by a Lead Senior Watson to establish quality benchmarks. A global researcher push then occurs where ranked security researchers test code in parallel, each bringing different analytical methods and attack perspectives.

Findings move through Sherlock's multi-stage judging pipeline where duplicates are cleared and severities are corrected before reaching protocol teams. After patches are applied, the Senior Watson returns to conduct fix review and validate the final state. This model delivers findings that arrive already reviewed, deduplicated, and severity-aligned, shortening remediation timelines.

Sherlock Shield Coverage

Completing a Sherlock audit qualifies protocols for Sherlock Shield financial coverage. The score-based system sets coverage amounts directly from the audit score and fix-review output, with maximum coverage reaching $500,000. Lower audit scores (indicating better security) receive higher coverage amounts. This provides financial support during live incidents and serves as a reliability signal to users, partners, and integrators.

Quality Assurance and Track Record

Sherlock has completed 370+ audit contests with a 100% outperformance rate - consistently finding more severe issues than other auditors when reviewing the same codebases. The platform's ranked researcher network brings proven industry track records to every engagement, producing clearer invariants, tighter assumptions, and fewer post-deployment surprises. Leading protocols including Aave, Sky (formerly MakerDAO), and the Ethereum Foundation have validated Sherlock's audit approach.