Overview
- The Ironwood testnet activated Saturday, July 4, to exercise a replacement shielded pool and new accounting checkpoints that let anyone check circulating ZEC without revealing private transaction details.
- Teams delivered two independent consensus implementations for Ironwood—one from Valar Group and one from the Zcash Foundation—with the Valar build already in audit.
- Developers report large wallet performance gains on testnet, cutting a ten-note migration from about 15 minutes to roughly 2.5 minutes and reducing signing time from nine minutes to about 37 seconds.
- Mainnet activation is targeted for late July but depends on completing audits and a formal proof of soundness for the new circuit and on exchanges, wallets and mining pools moving from zcashd to the new Z3 stack.
- Shielded Labs and other teams say some operators need more time to migrate, which could prompt mitigation steps or a delay, and users should expect further announcements before a firm mainnet date is set.