Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin acknowledged a major breakthrough in zero-knowledge (ZK) technology this week, calling recent developments in real-time proving a “truly amazing” step forward.
Buterin’s comments came in response to a post from developer Uma Roy, who announced that her team had achieved real-time Ethereum proving, an accomplishment many in the cryptography community had considered a “moonshot” just a year ago.
Performance gaps and verification hurdles
Roy’s post, which gained significant traction on social media, framed the milestone as a defining moment for the ZK field.
However, some observers, including researcher Zeng Jiajun, questioned whether the proving system was as revolutionary as it seemed, given past projections that such performance was years away.
While celebrating the advance, Buterin pointed out several reasons why the work, though impressive, should not be seen as production-ready for Ethereum’s Layer 1 network.
He noted that the current proving system only accounts for average-case scenarios and does not yet address worst-case performance, something necessary for reliable and secure Layer 1 implementation.
He also flagged the lack of formal verification, meaning the system has not undergone rigorous mathematical proof to guarantee its correctness.
Vitalik suggested that this remains a critical shortcoming in Ethereum’s high-stakes environment, where code immutability and financial risk are paramount.
Energy use and scaling goals
Another concern raised by Buterin was the system’s energy consumption. The real-time prover reportedly uses around 100 kilowatts of power, making it impractical for general-purpose or home-based use.
Buterin said that ideally, such systems should be operable on machines with about 10 kilowatts of capacity to ensure broader decentralization and accessibility, since proving could be done at home.
He also referenced Ethereum’s long-term scaling goals, specifically plans to increase the Layer 1 gas limit by 10x to 100x.
Achieving such a drastic increase in the limit would demand significant optimization in proving performance, reinforcing his argument that the technology still has several steps to go before it can be deployed at the base protocol level.
Despite these caveats, Buterin reaffirmed his admiration for Roy and her team’s work, describing it as a major milestone in the ZK landscape. However, he also noted that there is more to be done before Ethereum can fully integrate such advances into its core infrastructure.
