Still Missing In Web3
Despite explosive innovation in Web3 over the past few years, developers the backbone of the space still face major pain points. While we’ve seen huge progress in smart contract languages, frameworks like Hardhat, and even zero-knowledge toolkits, the Web3 dev stack is still painfully underpowered in key areas.
Here’s a breakdown of 7 developer tools Web3 still doesn’t have, but not in production-ready form.
⚙️ 1. Local Testing for Multi-Chain dApps
The pain: Building dApps that interact across chains (e.g., Ethereum + Arbitrum + Polygon) means you’re constantly deploying to testnets, simulating bridges manually, or mocking functionality.
What’s missing:
A local, multi-chain simulator with realistic block times, bridge delays, and contract deployments.
Chain “forking” environments that can simulate cross-chain liquidity, governance, etc.
Why it matters: Most serious apps now span multiple chains, but we’re testing them like it’s still 2020.
🔐 2. Debugging & IDE Tools for ZK Development
The pain: Zero-knowledge (ZK) development is exploding, but the experience is brutal. You’re building complex cryptographic circuits with little to no debugging support.
What’s missing:
Real-time ZK circuit debuggers (watch variable states, trace proofs, simulate inputs)
Visual editors for circuits (like Visual Studio Code for ZK)
“Linter” and error explainer tools for popular DSLs like Noir, Circom, Leo
Why it matters: ZK is the most powerful privacy & scaling primitive in Web3. But right now? It's reserved for cryptography PhDs.
🧪 3. Testnets That Don’t Suck
The pain: Testnets are slow, break often, and don’t reflect mainnet behavior especially around gas usage, MEV, or liquidity.
What’s missing:
High-fidelity simulated testnets that match real-world slippage, block sizes, and L2 conditions
Testnets that simulate real MEV and congestion scenarios
Why it matters: Devs ship smart contracts expecting smooth testnet behavior, then get burned on mainnet due to subtle mismatches.
👛 4. Multi-Wallet Dev Environments
The pain: Most frameworks only let you simulate a few hardcoded accounts. You have to switch wallets manually to test things like multi-sig flows, governance votes, and DEX liquidity provision.
What’s missing:
Environments that simulate dozens of real wallet types (EOAs, multisigs, contract wallets, smart accounts)
Snapshot testing for wallet behavior (simulate: “What if this multisig loses a signer?”)
Full WalletConnect simulation
Why it matters: Web3 UX depends on wallets but devs still don’t have tools to build or test for them properly.
🔄 5. State-Aware Dev Tooling
The pain: Smart contracts behave differently depending on past states (votes cast, tokens transferred, variables set).
What’s missing:
“Time travel” tooling: easily simulate contract state at block N
Test frameworks that automatically generate edge cases based on state mutation history
Why it matters: Bugs hide in state transitions. Good tooling can catch them before they hit production.
🔎 6. Production-Grade On-Chain Logging
The pain: Once contracts go live, debugging becomes a nightmare. Event logs are the only visibility and they’re limited.
What’s missing:
A robust, real-time on-chain logging system with webhooks, subscriptions, and conditional alerts
Dashboards for contract analytics like “top reverted calls,” “most gas-intensive functions,” etc.
Why it matters: Without visibility, smart contract bugs become on-chain disasters.
📦 7. Composable DevOps for Web3
The pain: Deployment and monitoring are still semi-manual. No standardized CI/CD pipelines, no automatic re-deploys, no seamless integration with off-chain frontends.
What’s missing:
GitHub-style CI/CD for smart contracts with versioning, test coverage, auto-deploys
Monitoring/rollback tools like Vercel or Netlify, but for on-chain contracts
Terraform-like infra-as-code for chain environments
Why it matters: Web2 developers expect smooth pipelines. In Web3, you’re on your own.
