Glossary

BIP 342 (Tapscript)

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Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP) 342 defines Tapscript, an update to Bitcoin’s scripting language. Tapscript enables Bitcoin nodes to create and validate Pay-to-Taproot (P2TR) outputs by upgrading the opcodes Bitcoin uses to evaluate scripts.

Tapscript changes how signatures are evaluated to take advantage of the efficiency improvements of Schnorr Signatures. In addition, BIP 342 adds several new null opcodes, called OP_SUCCESS, which allow Tapscript to be flexibly upgraded in the future.

Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 342 is part of the Taproot upgrade, which also includes BIP 340 and BIP 341.

➤ Learn more about Bitcoin’s Taproot upgrade.

Related Terms
Bitcoin Script
Script is the language Bitcoin uses to determine who can spend a given piece of bitcoin (a UTXO). Script is intentionally limited in order to maintain Bitcoin's simplicity and ensure that any individual can run a node and validate the blockchain.
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Tapscript
Tapscript is the scripting language used to enable a variety of new transaction types as part of the Taproot upgrade. Tapscript takes advantage of Schnorr signature aggregation.
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Schnorr Signature
Schnorr is a type of digital signature scheme similar to the ECDSA scheme. The Schnorr scheme presents several security, privacy, and efficiency advantages over ECDSA.
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Taproot
The Taproot upgrade is described in BIPs 340, 341, and 342, and introduces the Schnorr signature scheme, Taproot, and Tapscript.
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Script Witness
The Script Witness contains the signatures and appropriate script, which together unlock bitcoin sent in a SegWit transaction.
Learn more.
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