What is ERC-7575? Understanding Multi-Asset Vaults for DeFi

The growth of decentralized finance has created a need for more flexible vault standards. While ERC-4626 established a foundation for tokenized vaults, it faced limitations when dealing with liquidity provider tokens and multi-asset strategies. ERC-7575 addresses these challenges by extending ERC-4626 to support multiple assets or entry points for the same share token.

Before exploring what ERC-7575 is, it helps to understand ERC-4626, the tokenized vault standard it builds upon. ERC-4626, introduced in 2022, provides a standardized interface for yield-bearing vaults that represent shares of a single underlying ERC-20 token.

According to Ethereum.org's documentation, ERC-4626 in yield-bearing vaults lowers integration effort and unlocks access to yield in various applications with little specialized effort from developers by creating consistent implementation patterns. The standard defines functions for depositing assets, withdrawing funds, converting between assets and shares, and tracking vault performance.

However, Eco's comprehensive guide on ERC-4626 notes that before this standard existed, each DeFi protocol implemented its own unique vault architecture. This created custom integration requirements, security vulnerabilities, increased development costs, and limited composability across protocols.

The key limitation that prompted ERC-7575's development is that ERC-4626 requires the vault itself to be an ERC-20 token. This works well for simple vaults with a single asset, but becomes unwieldy for liquidity provider tokens and other multi-asset scenarios.

ERC-7575, formally titled "Multi-Asset ERC-4626 Vaults," is an Ethereum standard that adapts ERC-4626 to support multiple assets or entry points for the same share token. Created in December 2023 by Jeroen Offerijns, Alina Sinelnikova, Vikram Arun, Joey Santoro, and Farhaan Ali, the standard adds critical functionality for complex DeFi applications.

The official ERC-7575 specification defines three core components:

According to research from Centrifuge's documentation, ERC-7575 enables multitoken vaults where a single share token can be issued in exchange for multiple different underlying assets, providing greater composability and flexibility in portfolio management.

Multi-Asset Vaults under ERC-7575 allow users to deposit different types of assets and receive shares from a common share token. This differs significantly from standard ERC-4626 vaults.

In a traditional ERC-4626 vault, you might deposit USDC and receive vault shares that are themselves ERC-20 tokens. The vault contract handles both the share token functionality and the asset management. With ERC-7575, the share token exists as a separate contract, and multiple vault entry points can issue shares of that same token.

For example, imagine a liquidity pool that accepts both USDC and DAI. Under standard ERC-4626, you would need two separate vaults with different share tokens. With ERC-7575, you can have two entry point contracts (one for USDC, one for DAI) that both mint shares of the same underlying share token. Users can deposit either asset and receive proportional shares representing their position in the combined pool.

The technical implementation requires that each vault entry point implements the ERC-4626 interface excluding the ERC-20 methods. Instead, they return the address of a shared ERC-20 token via the share() method. When users deposit assets, the entry point increases the share balance of the receiver. When users withdraw, it decreases the share balance of the owner.

This architecture enables sophisticated DeFi strategies. Eco's Routes infrastructure demonstrates how multi-asset support becomes valuable for cross-chain stablecoin movement, where users need flexibility to deposit various stablecoins while receiving fungible shares representing their liquidity provision.

One of ERC-7575's innovations is the concept of "Pipes" – contracts that convert between external ERC-20 tokens without necessarily maintaining a traditional vault structure.

Pipes can be either unidirectional or bidirectional. A unidirectional Pipe implements only deposit functions, converting from one asset to share tokens without allowing redemption back to the original asset. This might be useful for one-way conversions or specialized financial instruments.

Bidirectional Pipes support both entry and exit functions, allowing conversion in both directions. The entry points lock or burn the asset from the sender and mint or transfer the share to the receiver. The exit points reverse this process, locking or burning shares and transferring assets back.

According to the official specification, both the asset and share must be ERC-20 tokens outside the vault when using Pipes. This creates flexibility for protocol builders to build token conversion infrastructure without the overhead of full vault accounting.

The multi-asset vault standard provides several advantages for DeFi protocols and users.

Pros:

Cons:

Research from Composable Security's analysis notes that evolving proposals like ERC-7575 extend the interface to support multi-asset vaults, but implementation requires additional security considerations around price oracle manipulation and asset conversion logic.

Try Eco Portal to experience how multi-asset infrastructure can simplify cross-chain stablecoin transfers using standards like ERC-7575.

ERC-7575 introduces an optional vault() method on share tokens that enables reverse lookup – finding which vault contracts handle specific assets for a given share token.

This method takes an asset address as input and returns the address of the vault that handles deposits and withdrawals for that asset. Combined with the VaultUpdate event and ERC-165 interface detection, this creates a complete discovery mechanism for multi-asset vault systems.

The official specification notes this feature remains optional to maintain backward compatibility with cases where the share token is an existing deployed contract that cannot be modified. However, new implementations should include this functionality to improve integration experiences.

For developers building aggregators or portfolio trackers, the vault lookup enables automatic discovery of all entry points for a given share token. This makes it easier to display complete information about liquidity positions without requiring hardcoded vault addresses.

Unlike ERC-4626, ERC-7575 makes ERC-165 support mandatory for both vaults and share tokens. ERC-165 is an Ethereum standard that allows contracts to publish which interfaces they support.

Vaults implementing ERC-7575 must return true when queried with the interface ID 0x2f0a18c5. Share tokens should return true for interface ID 0xf815c03d. This enables automated discovery and validation of ERC-7575 compliance.

According to Ethereum.org's documentation on ERC-4626, the ERC-7575 extension adds support for vaults with multiple assets by externalizing the ERC-20 token implementation from the ERC-4626 implementation. The enforced interface detection makes this externalization safer by allowing integrations to verify standard compliance before attempting interactions.

For protocols integrating multi-asset vaults, interface detection provides a programmatic way to validate that contracts follow the expected standard before committing user funds. This reduces integration risk and makes vault systems more reliable.

Several use cases benefit from ERC-7575's multi-asset capabilities, though adoption is still in early stages as of 2026.

Liquidity Provider Tokens: Traditional automated market maker pools like Uniswap V2 accept two tokens and issue LP tokens. With ERC-7575, protocols can create ERC-4626-compatible interfaces for these positions, enabling LP tokens to work with yield aggregators and other vault-aware applications.

Cross-Chain Bridges: Eco's technical overview of Routes describes how cross-chain infrastructure benefits from standardized multi-asset interfaces. When users need to bridge stablecoins between chains, accepting multiple stablecoin types for the same liquidity provision improves user experience and capital efficiency.

Multi-Collateral Lending: Lending protocols could use ERC-7575 to create vaults accepting various collateral types while issuing fungible debt tokens. This makes the lending position more composable with other DeFi protocols.

Yield Optimization: Aggregators can deploy multi-asset vaults that automatically allocate user deposits across different asset types based on market conditions, all while maintaining a single share token that represents the position.

Research from Centrifuge's implementation demonstrates real-world applications for tokenized real-world assets, where ERC-7575's flexibility suits the delayed fulfillment requirements of RWA protocols.

Implementing ERC-7575 vaults requires attention to several security concerns beyond standard ERC-4626 considerations.

The official specification highlights that ERC-20 non-compliant vaults must carefully handle redemption flows where the owner differs from the message sender. The standard ERC-20 approval mechanism doesn't work when vault and share are separate contracts. The recommended solution involves setting up the vault as a Trusted Forwarder of the share token using ERC-2771.

Price manipulation becomes more complex with multiple asset types. Each asset may have different market values and oracle dependencies. Vaults must implement robust price conversion logic that prevents attackers from exploiting price discrepancies between different entry points.

According to analysis from Composable Security, at the time of writing, Solodit indicates 265 findings related to ERC-4626, of which 169 are high and medium severity. This clearly indicates that implementation mistakes happen and have significant security impact. Multi-asset vaults add additional complexity that requires thorough auditing.

Best practices for ERC-7575 implementation include:

Understanding how ERC-7575 differs from its predecessor helps clarify when each standard is appropriate.

ERC-4626 requires that vaults themselves be ERC-20 tokens, meaning the vault contract implements both asset management and share token functionality. This creates a tight coupling that works well for single-asset vaults but becomes awkward for multi-asset scenarios.

ERC-7575 separates these concerns by allowing share tokens to be external contracts. Vaults become entry points that mint and burn shares of a separate token rather than being that token themselves. This separation enables the multi-asset architecture but breaks full backwards compatibility.

According to Ethereum.org's documentation, one missing use case not supported by ERC-4626 is vaults with multiple assets or entry points such as liquidity provider tokens, which are generally unwieldy or non-compliant due to the requirement that ERC-4626 vaults themselves be ERC-20 tokens.

For developers choosing between standards:

The decision often comes down to use case. Traditional yield farming vaults work fine with ERC-4626. Liquidity pools, cross-chain bridges, and complex strategies often benefit from ERC-7575's flexibility.

The official ERC-7575 specification provides reference pseudocode demonstrating the basic structure.

A Share contract implements ERC-20 functionality and maintains a mapping of assets to their corresponding vault addresses. When a vault address changes for an asset, it emits a VaultUpdate event. The contract also implements ERC-165 to return true for the ERC-7575 share token interface ID.

Each asset-specific vault implements ERC-4626 functions but points to the shared token via its share() method. For example, TokenAVault handles USDC deposits while TokenBVault handles DAI deposits, but both mint shares of the same Share token.

This architecture means users depositing different assets receive fungible shares that represent proportional ownership of the combined vault assets. The share token's vault() method allows reverse lookup to find which vault handles each asset type.

Developers building on this pattern should extend the reference implementation with proper access controls, conversion rate logic, and security features appropriate for their use case. The Eco Portal demonstrates how such infrastructure can enable seamless cross-chain stablecoin transfers in production.

As DeFi infrastructure matures, multi-asset capabilities become increasingly important for capital efficiency and user experience.

The stablecoin market exceeded $300 billion in early 2026, according to market data, and protocols need flexible ways to accept various stablecoin types without fragmenting liquidity. ERC-7575 provides a standardized approach for this requirement.

Cross-chain DeFi, in particular, benefits from multi-asset standards. Eco's approach to stablecoin infrastructure shows how simplifying stablecoin interactions across networks requires accepting multiple asset types while maintaining unified liquidity. The protocol brings together Routes, Accounts, and Crowd Liquidity to give developers ultimate flexibility while prioritizing speed, cost, and security.

Other emerging applications include real-world asset tokenization, where different asset types (bonds, real estate, commodities) might contribute to shared investment vehicles, and account abstraction systems that need to handle various token types seamlessly.

The standard's evolution will likely focus on gas optimization, improved integration patterns, and clearer security guidelines as more protocols adopt multi-asset vault architectures.

What is the main difference between ERC-4626 and ERC-7575?

ERC-7575 extends ERC-4626 by allowing vaults to have separate share tokens and supporting multiple assets or entry points for the same share token. While ERC-4626 requires vaults to be ERC-20 tokens themselves, ERC-7575 externalizes this functionality, enabling more flexible architectures for complex DeFi applications.

Can existing ERC-4626 vaults be upgraded to ERC-7575?

Yes, with some modifications. Existing ERC-4626 vaults can add ERC-7575 compatibility by implementing the share() method and ERC-165 interface detection. However, full multi-asset functionality requires additional vault entry point contracts and careful consideration of asset conversion logic.

What are Pipes in ERC-7575?

Pipes are converter contracts that facilitate token swaps between external ERC-20 tokens. They can be unidirectional (one-way conversion) or bidirectional (conversion in both directions). Pipes implement ERC-7575 interfaces but focus on token conversion rather than maintaining traditional vault accounting.

Is ERC-7575 widely adopted?

As of 2026, adoption remains limited compared to ERC-4626, though protocols focusing on multi-asset strategies and cross-chain infrastructure are beginning to implement the standard. The specification was introduced in December 2023, making it relatively new compared to ERC-4626's 2022 introduction.

What security risks should developers be aware of?

Key risks include approval flow complexity when vaults and shares are separate contracts, price manipulation through asset conversion logic, and the increased attack surface from multiple entry points. Developers should use audited libraries, implement robust price checks, and conduct thorough security audits before deployment.

How does ERC-7575 improve capital efficiency?

By allowing multiple assets to contribute to a single share token, protocols can aggregate liquidity that would otherwise fragment across separate vaults. This deeper liquidity reduces slippage and improves trading efficiency while simplifying the user experience of depositing various asset types.

Can ERC-7575 vaults work with existing DeFi protocols?

Integration depends on what the protocol expects. Since ERC-7575 vaults aren't ERC-20 tokens themselves, protocols that expect ERC-4626 vaults to be directly transferable may encounter compatibility issues. However, the share tokens remain fully ERC-20 compatible and work with any protocol that handles standard tokens.