---
title: "Zcash"
description: "Transparent t1 and t3, Sapling zs1, TEX and Unified Addresses under ZIP-316, F4Jumble undone and every item read. Sprout stays out."
canonical_url: "https://chains.agntn.dev/chains/zcash"
---
# Zcash

> Transparent t1 and t3, Sapling zs1, TEX and Unified Addresses under ZIP-316, F4Jumble undone and every item read. Sprout stays out.

<chain-facts chain="zcash">



</chain-facts>

## Address format

Four forms, and each one gets decoded, not measured. Transparent `t1…` and `t3…` are Base58Check with a two-byte version, `0x1cb8` for a key hash and `0x1cbd` for a script hash, 26 bytes with the checksum. Sapling `zs1…` is Bech32 over 43 bytes. A ZIP-320 `tex1…` is the same 20-byte key hash as a `t1…`, written in Bech32m so a wallet knows to send there from transparent funds only.

The Unified Address `u1…` is the interesting one. It bundles receivers of different pools into one string. Bech32m carries it past BIP-173's 90 characters, so the checksum runs over the whole thing. Under the checksum sits F4Jumble, a four-round Feistel permutation over BLAKE2b, there so that changing a few characters scrambles everything. The check undoes it and wants the 16 bytes at the end to spell `u` padded with zeros. Then it reads the items, the way ZIP-316 tells a consumer to for Revision 0: typecodes ascending with no repeats, 20 bytes for P2PKH and P2SH, 43 for Sapling and Orchard, never P2PKH and P2SH together, and at least one item that isn't transparent. A typecode it doesn't know passes, because the ZIP says a wallet has to skip those. MUST-understand metadata fails, Revision 0 has no room for it.

What it doesn't do is decompress the curve points inside a Sapling or Orchard receiver. `zcash_address` doesn't either, it takes the bytes at their length.

Sprout `zc…` addresses fail on purpose. Canopy closed the Sprout pool to new value in ZIP 211, so nothing can pay one. Testnet forms (`tm…`, `ztestsapling1…`, `textest1…`, `utest1…`) fail too.

The ZIP lets a Unified Address grow to about four megabytes, and the check reads all of it. That's around two seconds at the very top. A real one is under a millisecond.

The chain started from its own genesis block, so the CAIP-2 reference is plain BIP-122: the first 32 hex digits of the hash zcashd's `chainparams.cpp` asserts.

```ts
import { getChain } from "@agntn/chains";

const chain = getChain("zec");
chain.assertAddress("t1VmmGiyjVNeCjxDZzg7vZmd99WyzVby9yC"); // returned unchanged
chain.assertAddress("tex1s2rt77ggv6q989lr49rkgzmh5slsksa9khdgte"); // the same key hash, as TEX
chain.bip44; // 133
chain.caip2; // "bip122:00040fe8ec8471911baa1db1266ea15d"
```

## Spellings

`zcash`, `zec`, `Zcash`. The key is `zcash`, the ticker resolves through `getChain`.


## Sitemap

See the full [sitemap](https://chains.agntn.dev/sitemap.md) for all pages.