Crypto payroll is the practice of paying employees or contractors using digital assets as the settlement rail, rather than traditional wire transfers or ACH. Workers may receive funds directly to a digital wallet, or convert to local fiat currency routed to a bank account.

In practice today, that almost always means using stablecoins, or cryptocurrencies pegged one-to-one with a fiat currency (“digital dollars”).

How crypto payroll works

Most companies use a hybrid model, in which the employer funds payroll in fiat or a stablecoin, and workers may choose how they want to receive it: