GETTING STARTED

Claim a handle

A Tab handle is your payment identity. It looks like @yourname and it resolves — on any supported chain — to the wallet you control.

Rules

• 3 to 20 characters
• Lowercase letters, digits, and underscores only
• Unique across the whole Tab registry
• One handle per wallet at a time (you can rotate later)

How resolution works

When somebody pays @kofi, the Tab API looks up the handle in its registry, returns the wallet address, and the checkout settles into that address on the chain the buyer is paying on. There's no on-chain registry contract — the lookup is a plain database query, which is why claiming a handle is free.

Reserved names

A short list of identifiers (project names, trademarks, profanity) is held back. If you try to claim one we'll explain why; in most cases you can request a release by emailing hello@thetab.bar from an address that proves the trademark belongs to you.

Losing a handle

Handles aren't guaranteed forever. To keep the namespace usable, Tab reserves the right to reclaim a handle whose wallet has been inactive for a long stretch. The wallet itself is unaffected; only the human-readable alias would be released.