Zcash
Ranked 3 of 5 cryptocurrencies by recommenders
Recommended for zero-knowledge-proof privacy, with some preferring it to Monero. Critics say privacy is optional and a recent vulnerability was found.
Recommended for zero-knowledge-proof privacy, with some preferring it to Monero. Critics say privacy is optional and a recent vulnerability was found.
24 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 10
- criticize it
- 14
- approval share
- 42%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 10 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 0.7 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Seen as better than Monero
“They seem to have solved the private transactions problem, have a better anonymity set than monero”
Comment from 8 Dec 2025 in “I wasted years of my life in crypto” “IMO zcash is a better implementation than monero”
Comment from 23 Feb 2026 in “Binance Fired Employees Who Found $1.7B in Crypto Was Sent to Iran” “they have a better roadmap than Monero”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Bitcoin's big secret: How cryptocurrency became law enforcement's secret weapon” Privacy built on zero-knowledge proofs
“zcash is based on zeroknowledge proofs ground up so anonymous by default”
Comment from 21 Dec 2025 in “Privacy doesn't mean anything anymore, anonymity does” “how Zcash solves this with zero-knowledge proofs”
Comment from 10 Nov 2025 in “Show HN: Why Bitcoin's Transparency Is a Fatal Flaw – Free Book on Zcash” Mature, reliable design over a decade
“There are plenty of solutions to this problem. See eg the Zerocash paper and the Zcash chain, both decade+ old now”
Comment from 23 Jun 2026 in “Crypto in 2026: Oh, This Is the Bad Place” “seems much more reliable and long-term workable”
Comment from 29 Nov 2025 in “Chainalysis Successful Deanonymization Attack on Monero”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Privacy is optional, not default
“their privacy is optional, which is to say that when you need to swap it, your recipient will likely not accept the private version”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Bitcoin's big secret: How cryptocurrency became law enforcement's secret weapon” “The problem with Lightning or Zcash is that it is not private by default.”
Comment from 21 Apr 2026 in “Monero Community Crowdfunding System” “The "coin" you mention is not private by default, therefore "weaker".”
Comment from 29 Nov 2025 in “How stealth addresses work in Monero” - Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Bitcoin's big secret: How cryptocurrency became law enforcement's secret weapon”
Serious counterfeiting vulnerabilities found
“They accidentally published some values from the setup procedure they shouldn't have, and it could be used to forge proofs.”
Comment from 3 May 2026 in “Forging ZK proofs to mint arbitrary DUSK tokens” “The vulnerability could have been exploited to undetectably create an unlimited amount of counterfeit ZEC within Orchard.”
Comment from 5 Jun 2026 in “Researcher uses Opus 4.8 to find critical counterfeiting vulnerability in Zcash” “overlooked by multiple in-depth security audits”
Comment from 5 Jun 2026 in “ZEC drops 30% after Anthropic AI finds Zcash counterfeit vulnerability” Development controlled by one company
“The development of zcash is entirely controlled by Electric coin company, and they use this to control the zcash supply by taking a fraction of the coinbase outputs.”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Bitcoin's big secret: How cryptocurrency became law enforcement's secret weapon” “weak optional privacy, centralization and corporate/government ties”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Bitcoin's big secret: How cryptocurrency became law enforcement's secret weapon” Doubts about real-world use and survival
“Bitcoin will survive via an efficient layer 2, e.g. Lightning, but will Zcash?”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Bitcoin's big secret: How cryptocurrency became law enforcement's secret weapon” “It sounds like people still don't use it.”
Comment from 29 Nov 2025 in “Chainalysis Successful Deanonymization Attack on Monero”
Other cryptocurrencies people recommend
The four most recommended other cryptocurrencies, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monero (XMR) | 102 | 41 | 71% | 12 | — | Approved |
| Ethereum | 28 | 22 | 56% | 12 | — | — |
| ZcashThis page | 10 | 14 | 42% | 7 | — | — |
| Solana | 7 | 8 | 47% | 8 | — | — |
| Base | 5 | 0 | 100% | 4 | — | — |
What people said
32 of the 33 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“in practice, this is better realized by privacy coins like Monero and ZCash”
“users can be pressured to avoid anonymous transactions”
“Zcash make a significant contro to ZKPs though”
“Only because zcash trusts the sending node - whoever is hosting that ledger.”
“There are plenty of solutions to this problem. See eg the Zerocash paper and the Zcash chain, both decade+ old now”
“The vulnerability could have been exploited to undetectably create an unlimited amount of counterfeit ZEC within Orchard.”
“overlooked by multiple in-depth security audits”
“they got greedy and changed it”
“if you wanted to prevent anyone from knowing you bought XMR, than I think ZCash is a good choice.”
“ZCash is more friendly to govt so they still know you bought ZCash”
“They accidentally published some values from the setup procedure they shouldn't have, and it could be used to forge proofs.”
“The problem with Lightning or Zcash is that it is not private by default.”
“IMO zcash is a better implementation than monero”
“the optional transparency of zcash is a feature that makes zcash tenable from a regulatory standpoint”
“zcash is based on zeroknowledge proofs ground up so anonymous by default”
“the hard problem here is PoS consensus with the private transactions”
“They seem to have solved the private transactions problem, have a better anonymity set than monero”
“Then Monero, ZCash, etc built on that to add privacy and anonymity.”
“I know (and many others do as well, it's not that hidden) of the group that pumped Zcash. Very well executed pump”
“It sounds like people still don't use it.”
“It took at least half a decade if not a full decade to get to the obvious place and I (and everyone else) wrote Zcash off in that time.”
“It was a missed layer 8 opportunity on the part of Zcash.”
“The "coin" you mention is not private by default, therefore "weaker".”
“seems much more reliable and long-term workable”
“there is no mathematically conceivable solution that doesn't require escalating the transaction fees dramatically once the supply diminishes”
“I like ZEC, but that also doesn't mean I have to dislike XMR.”
“Bitcoin will survive via an efficient layer 2, e.g. Lightning, but will Zcash?”
“The development of zcash is entirely controlled by Electric coin company, and they use this to control the zcash supply by taking a fraction of the coinbase outputs.”
“weak optional privacy, centralization and corporate/government ties”
“they have a better roadmap than Monero”
“their privacy is optional, which is to say that when you need to swap it, your recipient will likely not accept the private version”
“how Zcash solves this with zero-knowledge proofs”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.