Polygon is releasing a public testnet for Hermez, an Ethereum scaling solution, as the competition for the dominant Ethereum Layer 2 solution begins.
Hermez, an Ethereum Layer 2 scaling solution, was bought by Polygon for $250 million at the end of last year. Hermez operates atop Ethereum and improves its scalability by letting it handle more transactions at a lower cost. This is the first opportunity for anybody to test the new network.
Hermez is a zkEVM, which is a sort of Layer 2 scaling solution that provides features that other Layer 2s do not, namely in the areas of security and application flexibility.
ZkEVMs improve upon all of the advantages of Layer 2s while enabling developers to construct Zero Knowledge (ZK) applications using the industry-standard programming language Solidity. This implies that apps and developers may take advantage of ZK’s security and scalability without having to learn a new programming language.
On the testnet, DeFi protocols such as Aave and Uniswap will be implemented at launch. This will enable these protocols and users to conduct Hermez experiments. It also allows the Aave and Uniswap teams to test for any faults well in advance of the mainnet deployment.
“In the end, Polygon zkEVM is the next stage in Ethereum’s evolution, and we are working towards providing our customers with the full advantages of a fully functional zkEVM — scalability without compromise. David Schwartz, a co-founder of Polygon Hermez, said, “We have some work to do before we can completely meet these objectives, and we’re excited to learn precisely what needs improvement and get feedback.”
All programs, tools, and user wallets created on Polygon’s proof-of-stake network will be compatible with Hermez, according to Polygon. This announcement is made just before to zkSync’s mainnet deployment on October 28.
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