Zcash Aims for NU7 Upgrade in November to Cut Block Time from 75s to 25s

Zcash's recent price surge reflects growing market interest in privacy coins. According to blockchain media Decrypt, the Zcash development team plans to apply the NU7 network upgrade on November 5, cutting block time from 75 seconds to 25 seconds. The key focus of this update is reducing the interval for transaction confirmation by a third while maintaining daily new ZEC issuance.

Zcash will increase daily block production threefold as block times shorten, so NU7 includes ZIP 218 to reduce mining rewards per block by about one-third, keeping total annual supply constant. Developer Shaun Bow announced that NU7 was applied to the testnet on October 6 for network testing under new rules, with final mainnet activation height scheduled for October 20.

The Zcash Foundation, Project Tachyon, Balair Group, ZODL, and Silde Labs have agreed on upgrade scope and schedule, with related specifications to be finalized by September 30. The project also confirmed it will maintain Bitcoin-style halving structure, with 24 million ZEC participating in the vote (66% of total voting supply) and 98.9% supporting retention of the existing model.

NU7 also includes a network sustainability mechanism that reserves approximately 60% of transaction fees, starting to pay additional mining rewards from February 2031 using accumulated funds since 2026. No major wallet changes or new transaction types are required for this update.

Zcash has recently experienced both network issues and price surges over recent months. After implementing the Ironwood upgrade in July to fix a four-year-old flaw that allowed counterfeit ZEC issuance, ZEC prices dropped up to 38% at one point. Since then, ZEC has risen over 2500% in the past year.