BIPs 340, 341 and 342 formalize Schnorr, Taproot and Tapscript
BIPs 340, 341 and 342 were assigned as the formal specifications for Schnorr signatures, Taproot and Tapscript, giving Bitcoin's next major soft-fork proposal a stable technical reference.
On January 19, BIPs 340, 341 and 342 were assigned for the Schnorr, Taproot and Tapscript proposal set. BIP 340 specified Schnorr signatures over secp256k1; BIP 341 described Taproot and its new output and spending structure; and BIP 342 defined the Tapscript rules used inside Taproot script paths.
The package was designed to improve privacy and efficiency for complex spending conditions while making many cooperative spends look like ordinary single-key spends. Schnorr signatures also enabled cleaner signature aggregation and removed several limitations associated with Bitcoin's existing ECDSA signatures.
Assignment as BIPs was an important specification milestone, but it was not deployment or activation. The proposals still required review, implementation, testing and a later activation process before they could become consensus rules on mainnet.