ConsenSys Unveils zkEVM Rollup Network ‘Linea’

Ethereum layer-2 ecosystem is heating up with the space seeing yet another entry by ConsenSys, an already established player in the industry. ConsenSys, the firm behind MetaMask, announced the launch of its layer-2 network – Linea – to the main Ethereum blockchain this week. It will soon begin onboarding partners as well.

The new layer-2 scaling solution is a zkEVM rollup network leveraging zero-knowledge proofs while making it an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) equivalent.

ConsenSys’s zkEVM Rollup Network – Linea

ConsenSys is the latest company to ride the growing trend of zkEVM with its new offering Linea that has already witnessed a successful testnet phase with 5.5 million unique wallets conducting more than 46 million transactions. According to the company, Linea has emerged as one of the largest and fastest-growing projects in Goerli.

Before hitting the mainnet at ETHCC, Linea will begin onboarding its launch partners starting this week.

“Linea combines the power of zero-knowledge proofs with full Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) equivalence, allowing builders to create scalable decentralized applications (dapps) or migrate existing ones without the hassle of changing code or rewriting smart contracts.”

As per ConsenSys’s announcement, the alpha release provides faster throughput while lowering the transaction fees up to 15x lower than Ethereum layer-1. The firm also said that the release will allow deeper integrations with its crypto wallet MetaMask.

Linea will be made available to users next week once partners have had an opportunity to onboard their dApps and infrastructure. The company also confirmed that the network uses Ether as its native currency, which is bridged directly from the Ethereum Mainnet. It urged users to remain cautious about fraudulent advertisements of an existing or imminent Linea token sale or drop.

zkEVM Popularity

A zkEVM is an EMV-compatible rollup that is secured by zero-knowledge proofs. By pooling in ZKPs with EVM compatibility, zkEVMs offer the security and privacy-preserving features of zk-Rollups while simultaneously enhancing Ethereum interoperability by protecting EVM compatibility. Such a system helps zkEVMs to be interoperable with smart contracts and decentralized applications (dApps) used on Ethereum.

The first zkEVM to be publicly available was zkSync’s solution called ‘zkSync Era,’ which went live to much fanfare in March. Days later, Polygon announced the final mainnet for its zkEVM product and added subsequent optimizations a month later.