Understanding Quadratic and Conviction Voting
Two alternative governance voting models, and what problems they're each designed to address.
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What to remember
- Both models are alternatives to simple one-token-one-vote governance.
- Quadratic voting makes additional votes on one option cost progressively more.
- Conviction voting grows a voter's influence the longer their support is sustained.
- Both remain less common in practice than standard token-weighted voting.
The problem with simple token-weighted voting
Standard one-token-one-vote governance can let a small number of very large holders dominate every decision, regardless of how many smaller holders feel strongly about an issue. Quadratic and conviction voting are two distinct alternative models designed to address different aspects of this problem.
Quadratic voting
Quadratic voting makes casting additional votes toward the same option cost progressively more, intended to better reflect the intensity of many smaller holders' preferences rather than letting concentrated holdings dominate every vote linearly.
Cost grows as votes squared, not one credit per vote -- casting more votes on the same option gets progressively more expensive.
Conviction voting
Conviction voting instead lets a voter's influence on a specific proposal grow the longer they keep their support committed to it, intended to favor sustained, genuine preference over proposals that only briefly attract attention.
Both remain less common than simple token-weighted voting
Most DAOs still use straightforward token-weighted voting; quadratic and conviction voting are more experimental models adopted by a smaller number of governance systems.
What to remember
- Both models are alternatives to simple one-token-one-vote governance.
- Quadratic voting makes additional votes on one option cost progressively more.
- Conviction voting grows a voter's influence the longer their support is sustained.
- Both remain less common in practice than standard token-weighted voting.