ZigZag

ZigZag is a decentralized exchange that is intended to be easy to use, reliable, secure, and low in fees. The exchange is built on ZK Rollups,a platform that allows users to trade, list, and market their favorite tokens on layer 2, with supported tokens that include Tether, Ethereum, Maker, Storj, Chainlink, WETH, and USD Coin. Problems ZigZag is attempting to solve are the lack of liquidity and orderbook depth, which have been issues that have held back other decentralized exchanges.

Those issues are not impactful on price movement with simple swaps, but when attempting to trade with larger order sizes; the best quotes usually require users to bridge back to mainnet Ethereum and pay its fees for aggregated liquidity that is available. The use of ZK Rollups can solve this by offering negligible fees on transactions, and ZigZag is aiming to acquire sufficient liquidity to the extent that users will not have to pay Ethereum gas fees on mainnet in order to get quoted for a similar price.

The decentralized exchange was launched on zkSync and is also intended to be launched on StarkNet. ZigZag is also working to develop a native protocol token to aggregate all fees paid into the ZigZag protocol.

ZigZag focuses on Zero-Knowledge technology by building on ZK Rollups. ZK Rollups is a layer 2 solution to the Ethereum main-net. ZK Rollups bundle transactions on layer 2 and aim to provide quicker transaction speeds and lower fees. ZigZag's orderbook is decentralized, allowing for users to trade without a registration. ZK Rollups are considered to be less vulnerable to economic attacks compared to Optimistic rollups, since the state is instantly verified and sent to layer 1. Also, they do not require a challenge period and allow for fast withdrawals to Layer 1, making them great for exchanges and other applications that require simple payments.

ZK Rollups also allow ZigZag to have a high liquid market in an orderbook, as the ZK rollup solves the scalability issue. Further, ZigZag also decentralizes its orderbook to allow users to trade in an instant, without a registration, and while keeping control over their funds.

In order to ensure liquidity, ZigZag offers the ZigZag Market Maker, which is a simple pre-rolled library for anyone who wants to run a small market on their own, without intermediaries or complexity. The library may require someone to set up a virtual private server. This is part of ZigZag's strategy to crowdsource market depth. With the Market Maker, providing liquidity is reduced to a series of copy-pastes and can be profitable depending on the traded pair for the end user.