A newly proposed upgrade to the XRP Ledger (XRPL) could significantly modernize how multi-signature transactions are coordinated.
The proposal (“On-Chain Cosigner”) has been submitted in the XRPL Standards repository.
If eventually adopted through the amendment process, it would allow signers to coordinate and collect multi-signature approvals directly on the XRP Ledger. There will be no need to rely on external communication channels and centralized coordinators.
The proposal was authored by Shawn Xie, Zhiyuan Wang, Chenna Keshava B S, and Mayukha Vadari.
As explained by prominent XRPL community member Vet, the proposal addresses one of the biggest shortcomings of the ledger’s existing multisignature implementation.
“On most chains and currently on the XRPL, multi-signers need to coordinate and collect signatures off-chain or with smart contracts,” Vet explained. “This adds native on-chain multi-sig coordination, completely decentralized.”
Eliminating the “last mile” problem
It should be noted that XRPL already supports multi-signature transactions, but the proposal argues that the current implementation still depends on an off-chain coordination process.
Today, a transaction must first be created and distributed manually to each authorized signer. Individual signatures are collected through external channels (email and so on).
The authors argue this process creates what they describe as the “last mile” problem.
If that coordinator loses collected signatures or goes offline, the signing process can fail.
Under the proposal, a participant would first create a TransactionProposal object directly on the XRP Ledger.
It would be permanently stored on-chain with an immutable transaction payload.
Each signature would be validated immediately upon submission and added to the proposal’s growing list of approvals.
Anyone could copy the completed transaction and submit it through XRPL’s standard transaction process. No additional signature assembly would be required.
Built for institutional workflows
The proposal places particular emphasis on enterprise and institutional use cases.
It notes that the feature is intended to complement several other advanced XRPL capabilities, including Batch transactions (XLS-56), sponsored fees and reserves, and future lending protocol operations.
