Shielded Labs Proposes Dynamic Fee Model for Zcash Transactions
Shielded Labs outlines a phased approach for dynamic market-based Zcash fees using median costs from recent blocks, aiming to combat spam, reduce congestion, and preserve privacy.
Shielded Labs has introduced a detailed proposal to replace Zcash's static fee model with a dynamic fee market based on the median fee per action observed over the prior 50 blocks. The system would use bucketed powers of ten to maintain privacy and open a temporary 10× fee priority lane during high demand. Initially deployed off-chain for monitoring, the plan may later become a consensus change. This blueprint follows the limitations revealed in ZIP-317’s action-based accounting, responding to rising transaction costs as ZEC’s price and activity surge. ZEC recently traded near $395, up 12% in 24 hours after the proposal’s release.
- Zcash: A privacy-focused cryptocurrency using zero-knowledge proofs to enable shielded transactions.
- Dynamic fee market: A transaction pricing system that adjusts based on recent network activity, allowing fees to vary with demand.
- Action-based accounting: A Zcash fee calculation method that charges per transaction component, such as spends or outputs, rather than by transaction size.