Bootstrap is now Sovright.
As we outlined in March, our first focus is on mining decentralization.
To that end, the Sovright Mining Pool testnet is now open.
The challenge
Proof-of-work blockchains like Zcash depend on miners to produce blocks. But miners don’t connect to the network directly. Instead, they connect through pools, which aggregate hashrate, assign work, and distribute payouts. This means the pool decides which transactions go into the blocks being built, rather than individual miners.
For Zcash specifically, that means shielded transactions have been at the mercy of pool operators who have had no obligation to include them. In Zcash, at least one pool has filtered out shielded transactions, with no way for individual miners to opt out. This is worrying given that private transactions are Zcash’s raison d’etre. Today, three pools account for 80% of the hashrate, making effective censorship quite possible.
Technically speaking, Bitcoin devs created a solution that existed for years at the protocol level. Stratum V2 returns transaction selection to individual miners, so a pool operator can no longer quietly decide what gets confirmed. Nobody has implemented Stratum V2 for Zcash, because dominant pools had no reason to hand control back to miners, while paying out in shielded ZEC adds technical complexity without an immediate revenue upside.
The urgency to change this is only increasing. Post-Ironwood upgrades have proposed reducing Zcash’s block spacing by a third. Faster blocks improve scalability and payment user experience, but also strengthen the advantages of large, well-connected mining pools. Infrastructure that can mitigate that pressure needs to exist as Zcash advances.
Sovright’s mining pool gives you two ways in: connect directly in 30 seconds, or run your own node and construct your own block templates. Either way, the fees are identical. Here are three ways in which Sovright’s solution is different from every other pool currently operating on Zcash.
Shielded payouts
Every major Zcash mining pool today pays out to transparent addresses, meaning miner earnings are publicly visible onchain. Sovright pays in shielded ZEC. We believe that this should be a non-negotiable feature for a network built on the premise of financial privacy.
Built for independent miners
The Sovright Mining Pool is designed for smaller individual operators, with no minimum hashrate and fleet monitoring tools for people running real hardware. Operators like Foundry play an essential role serving compliance-first, institutional participants. Sovright is focusing on the global, informal coalition of independent miners that the Zcash network could not exist without.
Transaction selection
Using Stratum V2, individual miners can choose which transactions go into the blocks they mine, fully, partially, or not at all, with identical fees at every level. In practice that means you can connect in 30 seconds and let the pool decide for you, or run your own node and construct your own block templates. The choice is yours, and it costs you nothing either way.
Testnet
The testnet is live at mining.sovright.com. Connect a miner, test the pool and fleet monitoring tools, and explore the first open-source Stratum V2 implementation for Zcash. Your feedback will help shape the mainnet launch.
About Sovright
Sovright is a portmanteau of “sovereign” and “rights.” The name is new, but our work isn’t. We’ve been mission-driven and working in the Zcash ecosystem since the start.
We won’t compete on work that’s already being done well. Instead, we’re laser-focused on neglected problems that support the long-term growth and well-being of the Zcash network.This mining pool is the first solution Sovright is releasing publicly. More is on the way.
Stay tuned!