With the upcoming v18 of Monero, ring size will be increased to 16. Why doesn't it get increased all the way to what is feasible? What is the purpose of increasing it incrementally on each upgrade? And doesn't this cause extra bloat on the blockchain? What are some of the cons of increasing it like this?
asked Jul 25, 2022 at 13:12
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1 Answer
Bigger ring size equals a larger initial anonymity set per transaction, but also a larger blockchain and slower synchronization. Hence this trade-off needs to be reassessed with each upgrade, which often includes other changes that affect synchronization speed for example. We can also factor in the general advances in storage cost and bandwidth capability.
What is "feasible" comes down to what balance we're happy with striking, at the time of upgrade. We could have had much larger ring sizes at any time since the introduction of RingCT, but the impact of download/verification/scanning would likely have been unacceptable to most.