The adoption of blockchain necessitates the attention of a wide range of elements, much beyond the primarily technological focus of most present investigations. The present inquiries do not provide appropriate models as to how SMEs ought to go about blockchain adoption. Thus, this research study sort to investigate the key factors that drive blockchain adoption and propose a research model that could be used to inform blockchain adoption by SMEs in the context of South Africa. Drawing on the innovation diffusion theory and technological, organizational and environmental factors a model was proposed. A quantitative study was carried out; survey data was collected from 167 SMEs. SPSS was used to analyze the collected data and AMOS to fit the model. The results revealed that organizational readiness, trading partner pressure, perceived benefits, complexity, top management support, and compatibility could significantly influence the adoption of blockchain. However, in the South African context, competitive pressure and government regulations & support were found to be insignificant.