We’re now 1 month into the Ignite program on ZKsync Era! Read on for a recap of everything that happened so far.

Initial Market Impact and Growth Metrics

The program's effectiveness was immediately evident in on-chain metrics. Within the first month, the TVL on ZKsync Era grew from $128 million to $250 million – $122 million growth, almost 100%. With a strategic allocation of 300 million ZK tokens through its duration, the program has established itself as a key driver of ecosystem growth and liquidity depth on the ZKsync Era network.

Strategic Token Distribution

The program's distribution strategy evolved across two bi-weekly periods:

Period 1 — Jan 6th - Jan 20th

• Total rewards: ~6.94M ZK

  • Lending: 2.8M ZK (40.4%)

  • DEXs: 2.6M ZK (38.0%)

  • Perpetual contracts: 600K ZK (8.7%)

  • Bonus budgets: LayerSwap (~500K ZK) and Jumper Exchange (~400K ZK)

Period 2  — Jan 20th - Feb 3rd

• Total rewards: ~9.56M ZK (58.3% increase from Period 1)

  • DEXs: 5.34M ZK (56%)

  • Lending: 3.43M ZK (36%)

  • Perpetual contracts: 792K ZK (8%)

  • Incentivised pools expanded: from 54 pools to 74 pools (+37%)

Overall

• Total rewards: ~16.5M ZK

• Lending rewards: 6.23M ZK

• DEXs rewards: 7.94M ZK

• Perpetual contracts rewards: 1.39M ZK

• Bonus budgets: LayerSwap & Jumper Exchange: 900K ZK

Ecosystem Integration and Protocol Participation

The program has successfully attracted and integrated major DeFi protocols across multiple sectors:

• DEXs: iZUMi Finance, Koi Finance, Maverick, PancakeSwap, Syncswap, Uniswap, WOOFi, zkSwap Finance

• Perpetuals: Holdstation, RFX, Vest Exchange

• Lending: Aave, Reactor Fusion, Venus Protocol, Zerolend

Key ecosystem projects like Koi Finance, Syncswap and Vest Exchange grew their TVL and volume by 2, 3 and 10x, as seen on DefiLlama!

Community Engagement and Growth

Alongside TVL growth and incentive distribution, the ZKsync Ignite program has led to an expansion of community participation:

• 3.2k members in the dedicated Telegram group

• 10.9K Followers on X

Key community members who have also shared their experience with the program:

Introducing Iggy, the Ignite Mascot

In January we introduced Iggy, the mascot of the Ignite program! Wait and see what’s coming for Iggy 🔥

What’s Next?

With Ignite Season 1 running through April 6th, there’s much more to come. The program will continue to:

• Adjust incentive distributions to optimise DeFi growth

• Onboard new projects to integrate the ecosystem and widen the opportunities for users

• Expand initiatives to foster long-term community growth

Stay tuned for next week’s full data report from Open Block Labs on the onchain performance of the program!

The ZKsync Ignite program is just getting started, and we’re excited about the future of the ZKsync Era!