zkVM — Zero-Knowledge Virtual Machine¶

Description¶

A zkVM proves the correct execution of a general-purpose program rather than requiring developers to express their computation as a hand-written arithmetic circuit. The prover takes a program (compiled to a known ISA such as RISC-V or MIPS) and an input, executes it, and produces a ZK proof that the output is correct. This inverts the usual circuit-first workflow: developers write ordinary code, and the zkVM handles the arithmetization internally.

zkVMs vs Circuit-Based Approaches¶

Aspect	Circuit DSL (e.g. Circom, Noir)	zkVM (e.g. RISC Zero, SP1)
Developer model	Write explicit constraints	Write ordinary code
Arithmetization	Manual, per-circuit	Automatic, per ISA
Proof size / speed	Smaller, faster for simple ops	Larger overhead, but improving
Flexibility	Optimised for specific operations	General-purpose
Maintenance burden	Circuit must mirror logic	Logic lives in one place

Arithmetization¶

zkVMs typically use AIR (Algebraic Intermediate Representation) to encode CPU execution traces, since AIR naturally captures sequential state transitions. STARK-based backends (zk-STARKs, FRI) are common. Some (e.g. ToolingApplication/SP1) use a PLONK-family backend over the execution trace.

Entries in this vault¶

Tool	Backend	ISA
ToolingApplication/RISC-Zero	zk-STARKs + FRI	RISC-V
ToolingApplication/SP1	PLONK / STARKs	RISC-V
ToolingApplication/OpenVM	STARKs	RISC-V (extensible)
ToolingApplication/Valida	STARKs	Custom
ToolingApplication/Pico	STARKs	RISC-V