Highlights: What are the main findings? Blockchain plays a foundational role in supporting secure, interoperable infrastructure for key urban services, particularly through integration with IoT, edge computing, and smart contracts. Research has shifted from general blockchain exploration to sector-specific applications, including decentralized healthcare, energy trading, smart mobility, and drone coordination. What is the implication of the main finding? Blockchain enables cross-sectoral innovation in smart cities by enhancing transparency, data integrity, and trust across complex urban systems. As both a technological and ethical infrastructure, blockchain supports the development of secure, resilient, and sustainable smart city ecosystems aligned with Industry 5.0 values. This paper explores the intersection of blockchain technology and smart cities to support the transition toward decentralized, secure, and sustainable urban systems. Drawing on co-word analysis and BERTopic modeling applied to the literature published between 2016 and 2025, this study maps the thematic and technological evolution of blockchain in urban environments. The co-word analysis reveals blockchain’s foundational role in enabling secure and interoperable infrastructures, particularly through its integration with IoT, edge computing, and smart contracts. These systems underpin critical urban services such as transportation, healthcare, energy trading, and waste management by enhancing data privacy, authentication, and system resilience. The application of BERTopic modeling further uncovers a shift from general technological exploration to more specialized and sector-specific applications. These include real-time mobility systems, decentralized healthcare platforms, peer-to-peer energy exchanges, and blockchain-enabled drone coordination. The results demonstrate that blockchain increasingly supports cross-sectoral innovation, enabling transparency, trust, and circular flows in urban systems. Overall, the current study identifies blockchain as both a technological backbone and an ethical infrastructure for smart cities that supports secure, adaptive, and sustainable urban development.