Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, has presented leanVM — a new virtual machine specifically designed to optimize ZK proofs and scale the network.
This is reported by Business • Media
leanVM: A New Approach to Scaling Ethereum
This year, the Ethereum team has made significant strides in long-term scalability, decentralization, and network resilience. Vitalik Buterin emphasized that key milestones in the short-term roadmap are already approaching realization, with leanVM standing out among new technological solutions — a minimal virtual machine built with modern ZK proof (zkVM) requirements in mind.
“The lean Ethereum team has done truly amazing work this year, advancing on all fronts to ensure long-term scalability, decentralization, and resilience for Ethereum. I expect all these ideas to come together around the same time the short-term scaling roadmap reaches its key milestones,” Buterin stressed.
leanVM is designed to enhance the efficiency of XMSS aggregation and recursive computations. It is based on a four-instruction architecture of the instruction set (ISA), utilizing multi-linear STARKs and cryptographic logup-lookups technology. This significantly reduces commitment costs compared to the Cairo solution.
Currently, the recursion speed reaches 2.7 seconds; however, the development team aims to accelerate this process tenfold. With leanVM, scaling costs can be reduced, making recursion technology significantly faster for the Ethereum network.
Synchronization of Roadmaps and Protocol Simplicity
Vitalik Buterin highlighted the importance of simplicity in designing blockchain protocols. According to him, every element of the system should contain a minimum number of lines of code, as protocols are a form of art that should be not only efficient but also aesthetically pleasing.
In response to questions about roadmap synchronization, Buterin explained that the lean direction is intentionally developing more slowly than short-term solutions. This will allow the lean roadmap to be implemented precisely when the core scaling solutions are already functioning in the mainnet. A key role in this process is played by the ZK-friendly ISA architecture, which enables network scaling without unnecessary infrastructural costs.
It is worth noting that in May of this year, the Pectra update was implemented in the Ethereum mainnet. The next major update, called Fusaka, is scheduled for launch in November 2025.