Results of the first Zealynx Audit Grants round: 8 protocols across 6 chains applied for subsidized smart contract audits, and every applicant received a grant. How the review worked, who won, what the strongest applications had in common, and how to prepare for Season 2.
Carlos (Bloqarl) - July 13, 2026
Season 1 of Zealynx Audit Grants is decided. Eight protocols applied, six chains were represented, and every single applicant left with a grant: one audit fully funded, every other applicant with at least half of their audit covered.
This page is the complete record of the round: how the review actually worked, who won and why, what the strongest applications had in common, and what it means for teams considering Season 2.
Zealynx Audit Grants funds smart contract security audits for early-stage Web3 protocols. Grants are percentage subsidies on real Zealynx engagements at our standard, published rate of $8,000 per auditor per week. There are no cash grants, no middlemen, and no separate "grants product": recipients get the same founder-led, senior-only audit our paying clients get, and every report is published when the engagement completes.
The program exists because of a trade-off we saw too many founders make: a serious audit costs more than an early runway allows, so protocols launch unaudited or do not launch at all. Season 1 was built to break that trade-off, with a total pool above $100,000.
| Applications | 8 protocols |
| Chains represented | 6 |
| Continents | 4 |
| VC-funded teams among applicants | 0 |
| Applications receiving a grant | All of them |
| Applications open → close | June 15 → July 6, 2026 |
| Winners announced | July 13, 2026 |
| Audits delivered | August – October 2026 |
Zero VC-funded teams is the number we are proudest of. Independent builders choosing their own auditor is exactly who this program was designed to reach.
Every application was scored against the published 100-point rubric: Protocol Merit (45 points), Product Engagement (40 points), and Independent Builder (15 points). Nothing about the rubric changed after applications opened.
The part we want future applicants to understand: the review is a code review. Every repository was cloned. Test suites were run. Line counts were verified against what applicants claimed. Testnet and mainnet deployments were checked on-chain. Private repositories were reviewed under mutual NDA, executed online in minutes through the application dashboard. Two evidence-backed score revisions were logged during review, both upward, both because verified facts surfaced that the first pass had undercounted.
And every applicant, selected or not, received an individual decision with the reasons. No form rejections, because there were no rejections at all.
Holdam — escrow for peer-to-peer deals with dispute resolution built in instead of bolted on. Stablecoins lock per deal and release only when the buyer confirms, the dispute window closes, or a staked juror panel votes. Never because platform staff decide. The audit sits directly on Holdam's launch path, which is precisely what the Core Grant is for.
SaabFi — credit against Bitcoin. Deposit cbBTC, borrow stablecoins against it, with underwriting margins calibrated on years of BTC price history rather than picked by feel. Already deployed to mainnet and deliberately paused until the audit. The highest-scored application of Season 1.
Moocon — prize-linked savings on Solana. Deposits earn lending yield, the yield becomes prizes drawn with verifiable randomness, and the principal stays redeemable one to one at all times. A proven idea from traditional finance, rebuilt so anyone can check the draw.
Yieldcoin — a crosschain stablecoin yield optimizer, and winner of the Chainlink Chromion Grand Prize. One deposit, allocated across chains and protocols through vault-to-vault messaging, rebalanced each epoch toward the best risk-adjusted yield.
SawaSwap — settlement rails between stablecoins and mobile money: an escrowed, atomic settlement layer where neither side can walk away with both assets, built for corridors where mobile money is how people actually transact.
Aegis — spending controls for AI agents. Autonomous agents get USDC accounts governed by a policy engine that enforces hard caps before any transaction leaves.
Further Builder Grants were awarded pending final steps with their teams.
The Builder tier was published at 25%. Then we reviewed the field: frozen commit hashes, honest line counts, real test suites, applications that read like engineering documents. A cohort this serious does not get the minimum tier, so we upgraded every Season 1 Builder Grant to 50%. One time, in return for the trust these teams placed in a first-season program.
The deeper principle is that applying to Zealynx Audit Grants has no losing outcome. Every serious application becomes a relationship: a grant where the fit is right, and where a full audit is not yet the right engagement, our Founder Security Sprint exists as the honest alternative. We would rather tell a founder the truth about what their stage needs than sell them the wrong thing.
For teams preparing for the next round, the pattern was unmistakable:
This is written into the program terms and it is non-negotiable: every grant audit is published in full as it completes. An audit nobody can read protects nobody. Published findings make recipients credible to their users, make the ecosystem smarter, and keep our work accountable in public.
Season 1 engagements run August through October 2026, and each report will be added to this page when it ships. If you want to evaluate whether Zealynx audits are worth applying for, the reports will be right here — judge us on them.
Season 1 proved the model: subsidized audits reach exactly the teams the ecosystem needs audited, and a program can be generous and rigorous at the same time.
Season 2 opens later this year. If you are building a protocol where a serious audit is the blocker between you and launch:
Questions about the results or Season 2: contact@zealynx.io or @vendrell46 on Telegram.