Zcash Issuance

Key Facts

• Zcash economics specifies a 21 million ZEC maximum supply, a 75-second target block interval, and a current 1.5625 ZEC block subsidy.
• Under the active NU6.1-era allocation, 80% of the block subsidy goes to miners, 8% to Zcash Community Grants, and 12% to Coinholder Funding through the lockbox.
• Observed chain value and circulating supply are not synonyms: the ledger labels the ZcashInfo chain observation and CoinGecko market estimate separately.
• The current allocation is protocol policy through the stated horizon, not a price forecast, an investment thesis, or a guarantee about later governance decisions.
• Transaction fees can change a block's total payout; the policy split in this article refers to the stated block subsidy rather than an invented all-in reward estimate.

Start with the word issuance, then separate the numbers

People often ask for the Zcash supply as though one number can settle the question. It cannot. A protocol cap is a rule about the maximum amount that can exist. A market-data provider's circulating supply is an estimate made for market reporting. An indexer's chain total is an observation of values it accounts for on chain. Those readings can be close without being identical, and they can differ for ordinary reasons such as update timing, treatment of locked balances, or provider methodology.

The Zcash Issuance Ledger therefore shows both market circulating supply and observed chain value without silently substituting one for the other. The ZcashInfo figure is a build-time observation assembled from its transparent, shielded, and lockbox value pools. CoinGecko's figure is its current market-supply estimate. The visible spread is context, not an error flag and not a reason to pick the more convenient figure for a headline.

That distinction also keeps shielded supply in its proper place. Shielded pool balances describe where indexed chain value sits. They do not make the total supply larger, and they do not disclose individual owners or payments. Issuance is about the monetary schedule and active block subsidy; pool composition is a separate privacy and chain-state question.

The current Zcash block subsidy

Zcash's published economics describe a maximum supply of 21 million ZEC, a roughly 75-second block cadence, and a current block subsidy of 1.5625 ZEC. The subsidy is the protocol issuance associated with a block. Its amount is distinct from transaction fees, which can make an observed block payout differ from the subsidy alone. Keeping that line sharp matters when a dashboard displays a block reward and a reader assumes every part of it follows the same allocation rule.

The supply schedule includes halvings on an approximately four-year cadence. A halving changes the protocol subsidy, not the ownership of existing ZEC. The current subsidy tells a reader how much new protocol issuance is scheduled per block today; it does not say how much is held by users, whether coins are actively traded, or how much value has moved through a shielded route.

A useful mental model is an accounting clock. The cap is the outer boundary. The subsidy is the tick. The chain height records how many ticks have occurred. Market supply and chain-value views sit beside that clock, each with their own methodology. Mixing them into one unsigned number produces a confident-looking answer that is less honest than the source data.

How the active funding split works

The active post-NU6.1 policy directs 80% of the current block subsidy to miners, 8% to Zcash Community Grants, and 12% to Coinholder Funding through the lockbox. On a 1.5625 ZEC subsidy, those shares are 1.25 ZEC, 0.125 ZEC, and 0.1875 ZEC respectively. The ledger shows the arithmetic so a reader can inspect the rule instead of treating the labels as vague categories.

Funding streams are part of consensus policy, not a donation widget bolted onto a website. The relevant record is the network-upgrade and ZIP material that defines where the subsidy is directed and the time horizon of that choice. That is why the ledger links its allocation labels directly to official upgrade and ZIP sources rather than repeating a secondary summary without provenance.

The policy should still be read with a boundary around it. An allocation tells you how the current block subsidy is directed under the active rules. It does not tell you the market value of that subsidy, whether a future policy will be adopted, how efficiently a recipient spends funds, or whether a particular grant or organization deserves endorsement. Those are separate governance and market questions.

Why observed supply can disagree with circulating supply

The ZcashInfo-based chain observation shown here sums the indexed transparent, shielded, and lockbox pools at the snapshot height. CoinGecko publishes market fields from a different provider process and timestamp. Neither field is a substitute for the other. A market circulating estimate may use rules about exclusions or available supply that are appropriate for market reporting; an indexed chain total is designed to describe observable chain accounting.

The right response to a mismatch is not to round both figures until they look identical. Check the timestamp, source, and definition. A small spread can arise from indexing lag or refresh windows. A larger or persistent spread is a prompt to inspect the provider method, not a license to make claims about missing coins or hidden issuance. The Zcash protocol cap is a protocol rule; third-party presentation of current supply is a reporting layer.

This is also why the page does not call observed chain value 'circulating supply' and does not use a shielded-pool total as a proxy for total issuance. Each number has a job. The page names that job before showing the number.

What the issuance ledger can and cannot answer

The ledger can show the current source snapshot, the stated cap, current subsidy, active allocation percentages, and the provider boundary between chain observation and market circulating-supply reporting. It can tell a reader where to verify the underlying records. It can also make the arithmetic behind the active split explicit without pretending that protocol mechanics require a market prediction.

It cannot tell you whether ZEC will rise or fall, how much of the supply belongs to any person, how many users hold shielded ZEC, whether a specific block's transaction fees were material, or what future governance will decide. Those claims require other evidence, and several of them are not publicly knowable in a privacy-preserving system. A precise-looking issuance dashboard becomes misleading the moment it fills those gaps with invented certainty.

For a current reading, use the in-page snapshot and open the linked provider records. For the economic design, read the official economics overview and the active NU6.1 and ZIP material. For privacy context, use the shielded-supply page, which deals with the location of aggregate chain value rather than the issuance schedule.

Method and review contract

The browser does not call market or blockchain providers. A validated build-time snapshot records the ZcashInfo dashboard data, CoinGecko market data, and the snapshot timestamp. The ledger derives remaining supply only from the stated 21 million cap minus the observed chain-value total, then labels that derivation. It does not imply that the result is a market circulating-supply calculation.

Official Zcash economics and NU6.1 material provide the 21 million cap, 75-second target, current subsidy, and active funding allocation. ZIP 1016 and ZIP 2001 provide the underlying funding-stream and lockbox context. Every lens retains a crawler-visible source and method ledger, so switching an interface control never hides the evidence needed to interpret the number.

This article has a 30-day review window. A changed policy, new halving context, provider outage, or material source-method change requires a fresh editorial review. Until that review happens, the page remains a dated reference snapshot, not a live feed and not financial advice.

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