# Introduction

## What is a vault?

A vault is a smart contract that automates depositing capital into a DeFi protocol. Vaults also commonly pool capital from various users and create economies of scale through reducing gas costs and achieving higher levels of protocol incentives.

Vaults are a great way to participate in DeFi:

* Minimal maintenance (compared to manually using a protocol)
* Useful metrics to help evaluate opportunities (vault user interfaces commonly show APY, overall value locked in an opportunity, deposit history, etc.)
* Helpful with discovering new protocols
* Often cheaper to use than protocols directly, sometimes with higher returns

### Guides: Jump right in

Follow our handy guides to get started on the basics as quickly as possible:

### Fundamentals: Dive a little deeper

Learn the fundamentals of Yagi to get a deeper understanding of our main features:

{% content-ref url="erc4626" %}
[erc4626](https://docs.yagi.fi/products/vaults/erc4626)
{% endcontent-ref %}