Quick start

This page shows you how to create and prove a Fibonacci program.

Start with the Fibonacci template

1. Create project

cargo pico new --template basic Fibonacci

This creates a directory Fibonacci with the basic template, which contains a fibonacci program.

2. Build program

# Build program in app folder
cd app
cargo pico build    

This will use the Pico compiler to generate a RISC-V ELF that can be executed by the Pico ZKVM.

3. Prove program with Pico (Default Path)

# Prove in prover folder
cd ../prover
RUST_LOG=info cargo run --release

The prover subdirectory contains a Rust program that will load an input for the ELF that was just compiled, execute it, and generate a proof. This project has the entire functionality of the Pico SDK at its disposal, and can be customized however you want.

If you simply wish to use the default provided proving clients and options, you can prove using the Pico CLI via

RUST_LOG=info cargo pico prove --input "0x0A000000" --fast --elf /path/to/elf # input n = 10

The input to the fibonacci program is a single u32 specifying which number to compute, so we can directly pass the input with the --input option, supplying little endian bytes. --fast simply tells the prover to skip any recursion steps and terminate after finishing the RISC-V proof.

4. Prove program with AOT (Experimental)

AOT is an alternative execution path: the emulator thread can be driven by AOT-compiled chunks generated from the specific guest ELF you are proving, instead of the interpreter. This trades a one-time codegen step for reduced per-proof execution cost.

• One-Time setup

Install the AOT codegen binary:

cargo +nightly-2025-08-04 install \
  --git https://github.com/brevis-network/pico \
  --tag v2.0.0 \
  pico-aot-codegen

• Generate AOT chunks

The generated chunks are tied to the PC ranges of a specific ELF. You must re-generate whenever app/src/ changes.

From the project root, after cargo pico build:

PICO_AOT_RUNTIME_SPEC='git = "https://github.com/brevis-network/pico", tag = "v2.0.0"' \
  generate_crates app/elf/riscv64im-pico-zkvm-elf ./aot-generated

PICO_AOT_RUNTIME_SPEC tells the codegen tool to wire pico-aot-runtime as a git dep in the generated chunk crates, so aot-generated/ works at the template root without requiring a local Pico checkout.

• Prove with --aot

Enable the template’s aot feature and pass the --aot runtime flag:

cd prover
RUST_LOG=info cargo run --release --features aot -- --aot

Project Layout

Fibonacci
|—— app
     |—— elf
          |—— riscv32im-pico-zkvm-elf
     |—— src
          |—— main.rs
     |—— Cargo.toml
|—— lib
     |—— src
          |—— lib.rs
     |—— Cargo.toml
|—— prover
     |—— src
           |—— main.rs
     |—— Cargo.toml
|—— Cargo.toml
|—— Cargo.lock
|—— rust-toolchain     

The template project includes 3 workspace members: app, lib and prover

app: contains the program source code, which will be compiled to RiscV

app/elf: contains ELF with RISC-V instructions.

lib: contains components or utilities shared in multiple modules.

prover: contains the scripts to prepare program input data and execute the proving process.

Start with the EVM template

Minimum memory requirement: 32GB

1. Create and build the EVM Example Project

   cargo pico new evm-example --template evm
   cd evm-example/app/
   cargo pico build
   

   This uses the evm template, which will set up a proving script that will generate a Groth16 proof suitable for verification via smart contract on an ETH compatible chain.

2. Prove program to EVM

   cd ../prover
   RUST_LOG=info cargo run --release
   

   This step will locally set up the Groth16 Verifier contract and generate the Pico Groth16 proof. The files will be outputted to the root/contracts/test_data folder.
   The prover program will then attempt to launch a Docker container to generate the final EVM proof with gnark. This ingests test_data/proof.json and should produce test_data/proof.data. If this file is not produced, you may need to increase the amount of RAM available to the container.

3. Test EVM Proof

   cd ../contracts
   mv -f ./test_data/Groth16Verifier.sol ./src/Groth16Verifier.sol
   forge test
   

   The foundry test script will parse the proof generated in the previous step and interact with the Groth16 Verifier contract. With all tests passing, the EVM quick start is successful.