ZK Technology Timeline Reveals Major Milestones

A16z Crypto posted an infographic by Claire Kart detailing the historical past of Zero-Data (ZK) proofs. She appeared again to 2019, when all the things was nonetheless small and with few assets. She is conscious of 80 p.c of the timeline in 2025, which underlines the non-public and industrial improvement.

Six years in the past, once I first began working in zk, it was a small group of cryptographers and I did not perceive something

Furthermore, there have been no assets for studying

At this time I learn this and understood 80% of it

search for the factor that actually melts your face and attempt to perceive it pic.twitter.com/QrPr4boloK

— Claire Kart (@clairekart) October 23, 2025

Early Foundations: 1985-2007

GM85 was the primary instance of ZK proofs, and on this work GM proposed interactive zero-knowledge proofs. The sum-check protocol additionally enabled the verification of calculations at scale in 1990. In 2007, structured proofs of possession (PoPs) improved privateness and outlined the emergence of sensible functions.

In 2010, SNARKs had been additionally based mostly on KZG poly-commitment. In 2013, the primary SNARKs had been environment friendly and enabled using blockchain. In 2016, recursive SNARKs had been launched, permitting for the development and scaling of proofs. Zcash (2017-2018) launched zk-SNARKs, which use transaction info to cover the information, turning into the primary real-world utility.

Clear proofs and rollups

Clear poly-commitment was additionally introduced in 2019 with FRI, Bulletproofs and Ligero. Halo Recursion (2019-2020) diminished startup prices and improved effectivity. Scaling options on Ethereum have additionally been developed as validity combos (2019-2022), which have been adopted by StarkNet. Skilled SNARKs akin to Plonk, Marlin and zkDSLs akin to Circom and Halo(2) made the event of ZKs extra accessible to a wider viewers.

Fashionable developments: 2023+

In 2023, ZK expertise moved to SNARKs utilizing sum checking based mostly on zkVMs on normal instruction units akin to RISC-V. This improved higher interoperability and enabled normal goal blockchain computations. There may be elevated entry to academic assets akin to 0xPARC guides and zk-learning.org by builders. The ZK rollups course of billions of Ethereum transactions, bettering scalability and decreasing prices. Claire began in 2019 and needed to maneuver in a small society with restricted assets. In 2025, she is conscious of 80 p.c of ZK developments. She teaches folks learn how to learn troublesome points that actually soften you away, and emphasizes perseverance and curiosity.