The Versatile Data AcQuisition (VerDAQ) system is a modular and flexible data acquisition platform designed to be used in a wide range of high-energy physics experiments, from small desktop detectors to large experiments in accelerators. The main characteristic of VerDAQ is its flexibility that stems from a modular design, separating the front-end electronics in a mezzanine board from the back-end electronics on a motherboard. The latter includes a programmable System-on-Chip (SoC) that provides preprocessing and communication capabilities. The VerDAQ system is hardware and firmware reconfigurable, enabling its use in standalone instruments as well as integrated into extensive data acquisition systems. In this paper, the system structure is described in detail, and a particular implementation of a laboratory prototype using the DRS4 chip is characterized and used to demonstrate standalone operation.