The Zcash Arborist Calls are bi-weekly protocol development meetings focused on tracking upcoming protocol deployment logistics, consensus node implementation issues, and protocol research.
This summary focuses on the last call that took place on 10/30/2025
The team published NU6.1 release candidates with major progress Zebra’s initial sync now takes 8 hours instead of 24.
Added assembly code to getrawtransaction & getblock outputs
Fixed main branch build issues
Refactored state service traits
Ongoing work focuses on refining error types for better reliability and switching to system RocksDB to speed up build times. Steady improvements across performance, code quality, and developer experience.
Fixes include:
Mempool detection & state management updates
Confirmation handling improvements
Progress on SendMax (sweep all funds) feature
Work on ephemeral transparent addresses useful for swaps & refund addresses
Zallet update:
A new alpha release is on the way
It includes major bug fixes, user feedback improvements, and most importantly reproducible builds thanks to Anton (StageX) ensuring build determinism across releases
The team is progressing on Zallet integration through the new chain index interface.
They’re migrating code to a more generic, trait based pattern, cleaning up redundancies, and upgrading the test infrastructure to better handle chain forks.
Adding transparent data to compact blocks to reduce leakage.
Finalizing block explorer RPCs (4 in review, most landing this week!) Solid momentum from the Zaino team
Zaino and Zebra will fully support block explorer RPCs and transparent data indexing from Genesis, enabling long time holders to import old transparent funds into modern shielded wallets.
A key step toward Ledger shielded ZEC support.
The teams continue progress on zcashd deprecation, lightwalletd now getting its final major feature: transparent data addition to the compact block processor.
This boosts privacy & reduces what servers can infer from user queries.
Timelines for zcashd have shifted slightly to early 2026, as teams prioritized stability amid increased network activity.
Despite the delay, collaboration continues strong with open tasks now listed on Zallet’s repo for community contributors.
ZIP 233 PR has been updated, rebased and now passes all CI checks just waiting to be merged.
Steady progress toward refining Zcash’s protocol features.
Crosslink Milestone 4A wrapped successfully.
The new in-house BFT implementation (replacing Malachite) is stable and crash-free a major step forward.
Next milestone 4B will introduce delegation fields in transactions, moving closer to real proof-of-stake testing.
There’s been renewed buzz about Zcash on X including discussions on proof-of-work vs proof-of-stake and whether to pause Crosslink. The team remains focused on completing a full-stack working prototype, followed by evaluation and design hardening.
Community feedback wanted:
@aquietinvestor reminds everyone to review the recent Crosslink staking design blog post and share opinions for or against.
Crosslink, Tachyon, and dynamic fees can all progress in parallel, strengthening Zcash’s future scalability and sustainability.
Looking ahead:
The team plans to begin ZIP drafting early 2026, ensuring specifications lead implementation.
External audits of Crosslink’s economics and security will follow the prototype phase keeping transparency and rigor at the core.
The Quantum Recoverability draft is now live and ready for community review.
If you’re familiar with post-quantum security or know experts in that area please take a look, your feedback is valuable in strengthening Zcash’s long-term resilience.
Alfredo raised an important usability question proposing a new status RPC method for Zallet, to indicate how far sync has progressed and when it’s ready to receive requests. This would simplify testing and debugging across Zaino, Zebra, and Zallet layers.
Str4d & Daira discussed designing a dedicated RPC for sync and health checks, similar to getblockchaininfo but tailored for multi component setups like Zallet + Zebra. It could also evolve into a “health API” to monitor network readiness and node performance.
The team also revisited ping/pong RPC logic originally inherited from Bitcoin and agreed it may be best not to reintroduce it in Zebra, due to potential side-channel vulnerabilities. Security and minimalism remain top priorities.
From ZcashD deprecation updates to new RPC design discussions This week’s call highlighted steady technical progress across ECC, ZF, and ZingoLabs with collaborations. post-quantum readiness, and performance improvements all moving forward.
