Vitalik Buterin says the race for speed in the zero-knowledge Ethereum era is over, and security should now come first. In a post on X, he congratulated the ZKsync Airbender team for a new milestone and stated that the fight for speed is definitively won. He wants teams building zkEVMs, which are tools that prove Ethereum transactions with math, to focus fully on security from here.
Three key goals for Ethereum
He named three goals for formal verification. The first is proving that the mathematics behind the proofs matches the Ethereum spec exactly. The second is a hard maximum on prover cost for the amount of gas in a block. The third is the security of the proof system itself. Ethereum's roadmap leans more on zero-knowledge proofs to check blocks, so a proof that is fast but incorrect is dangerous.
Big congratulations to the @zksync airbender team for this milestone. At this point, I consider the battle for speed to be definitively won, and the top priority for zkEVMs should shift fully to security. To me that means formally verifying (i) equivalence of the arithmetization to the ethereum spec (ii) a hard maximum bound on (prover cost) / (amount of gas in block) (iii) security of the proof system itself https://t.co/cgtFXBpicf
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) October 15, 2026HOT Stories
A prover that costs too much for heavy blocks may also push smaller operators out, which hurts decentralization. Vitalik is calling on developers to close those gaps before the technology carries real weight.
What's with Ethereum's price?
The news comes at a weak time for the price. ETH trades near $2,365 on the daily chart, down about 15% from the late September high near $2,800. It fell through the blue and cyan averages around $2,490 and $2,550 and is now sitting at the orange average near $2,360. The black average near $2,305 is the next support, just below the recent low of $2,313.
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Volume is steady but not strong, and the RSI is near 38, close to oversold. That indicates sellers have control, but a bounce could form if the orange and black averages hold. A move back above $2,490 would be the first sign of recovery.
Vitalik's message is not a short-term price trigger. Security work is slow, and traders are unlikely to react to it. Still, it sets a clear direction for Ethereum's technical road. If teams follow it, the network could end up with proofs that are fast, cheap, and trusted, which is what the roadmap needs. For now, the chart will decide the next move, and a break below $2,305 could put the larger recovery since August at risk.