ZKsync, located in the Ethereum ecosystem, announced that its original payment-focused ZK-rollup solution, ZKsync Lite, will be completely shut down on May 4, 2026. This development marks the final stage of the project’s strategy to focus its engineering resources and liquidity around ZKsync Era and the growing “Elastic Chain” ecosystem.
Closing Process and the Role of ZKsync Lite
ZKsync Lite was launched in 2020 for low-cost ETH and token transfers. However, ZKsync Lite, which lacks smart contract support, quickly fell behind ZKsync Era, which is compatible with smart contracts. Matter Labs, which developed the protocol, stated that this step was mandatory in order to shift the development focus to new generation scalable solutions.
User Entities and Migration Path
With the closure announcement, it was announced that ZKsync Lite will cease processing new transactions starting May 4, 2026. Despite this, users’ assets on the platform will remain safe and it will be possible to withdraw these assets through a special interface for those who wish. The ZKsync team recommends that users migrate their assets to the ZKsync Era or Ethereum mainnet before this date to avoid any possible service disruption.
It was reported that balance transfer was made easier thanks to the updated bridge interface of the protocol, and it was emphasized that the closure would not have any negative impact on ZKsync Era.
In addition, companies and individual users providing services on the network were asked to review their remaining balances and complete the necessary transactions in a timely manner.
Change of Direction in the ZKrollup Ecosystem
Recent developments in the Layer 2 ecosystem show that old, application-specific rollup solutions have begun to be replaced by more modular and interoperable structures. By catching this change, ZKsync is turning to innovations such as “User Artificial Intelligence” integrations and hardware-based isolation features in its road map. A similar technical transformation was also observed in the NEAR Protocol.
In addition, the development of decentralized finance applications requires the protocol to provide strong support not only for individual transfers but also for complex DeFi transactions. This transformation is in line with ZKsync’s goals of increasing competitiveness and improving user experience.
Artificial intelligence-based technologies and changes in the global environment across the cryptocurrency markets are accelerating the creation of new road maps in decentralized network structures. The response of crypto assets such as Bitcoin to macro dynamics constitutes another dimension of this transformation.
