- The advancement of zkEVM could drive an improvement in adoption in 2023
- Despite the potential, the TVL of ZK rollups may hold back Ethereum
For most of 2022, several Ethereum [ETH] scaling solutions came from the opportunity to help the blockchain’s lagging transaction speed. This was done without compromising security and decentralization. And yet it was for this reason that Optimistic roll-ups included Optimism [OP] And arbitration gained widespread acceptance.
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Roll-ups can’t go past Optimism
Zero-knowledge (ZK) roll-ups are part of the scaling solutions developed to solve the inherent scalability problem. Unfortunately, this group has not been able to attract attention like its bullish counterparts, despite the plethora of ZK Ethereum Virtual Machines (zkEVMs)
For context, the zkEVMs help to execute smart contract transactions in a compatible way with zk proofs that exist on the Ethereum infrastructure. Therefore, this leads to customizable off-chain and on-chain scaling.
Bankless, in his recent newsletter, highlighted the possibility of zkEVMs replicating the optimistic rollup 2022 performance. But why do these projects have the potential? According to the blockchain insight platform, ZK rollups have the potential to become Ethereum’s mainstream scaling platform as it could boost transaction speed by 6500%.
However, there are limits if these rollups can reach their potential. The most notable is the Total Value Locked (TVL) factor. The TVL describes the amount of underlying delivery that is fully secured by a protocol.
At press time, L2BEAT revealed that none of the ZK rollups could have toppled Arbitrum or Optimism by this statistic. The largest ZK rollup dYdX had only a TVL of $360 million. This was well below the optimistic leaders who run into the billions of dollars. This implied a battle in unique liquid deposits for ZK rollups.
Source: L2BEAT
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zkEVMs to the rescue?
On the bright side, however, zkEVMs seem poised to balance the optimistic dominance with the layer-one (L1) projects. This is because there are new developments that could change the course of the scale race. In particular, type 1 to type 4 zkEVMs don’t hold back in their quest for compatibility with Ethereum applications.
Companies like Starknet are already in phase 3 of the process. zkSync launched its Mainnet for developers back in February. And more may be on the way Polygon [MATIC] already has March 27 ahead of him Mainnet beta launch.
It’s worth noting here that Bankless admitted that it may take some time for these EVMs to catch up with the ground gained by the layer-two (L2) protocols.
In conclusion, there is no certainty that Ethereum would upgrade to zkEVM on-chain scaling. The capabilities can’t be written off, though, as Starknet, Polygon, and other EVM developments could see intense adoption later in the year.