Earlier quoted context omitted.
I find Zig to be a saner Rust alternative, with the caveat that it is still a immature (but getting there). Give it a few years and it will be a very strong contender. The true C successor.
I like Zig, too. Not sure if it's a Rust alternative as in you still have to manage the memory yourself. But is much simpler, easier to read, easier to understand, easier to follow and easier to reason about. It's less verbose and more productive. It feels like what C would look like had it been invented today.
Re: safety guarantees, much digital ink has been spilled on how Zig can give Rust a run for its money when it comes to safety.
When people say: Rust C++, Zig C; they forget that C++ was precisely meant to be an enhanced C, which is what Zig is trying to accomplish. They simply eschewed chasing complexity as the holiest of holy grails, which in turn leads to the cognitive load of writing/reading Zig code to be MUCH smaller than C++ or other langs in that space.
All that said, I'd never recommend a company build their product on Zig just yet, at least not with some kind of red telephone to the Zig team or a dedicated Zig developer, given it's still not fully mature.
Re: managing memory yourself, Zig's defer makes this much, much more straightforward than you would think, and feeding in your own allocators can simplify this in many cases (and make testing for leaks much easier).