  We present EZ, a novel current deposition algorithm for particle-in-cell
(PIC) simulations. EZ calculates the current density on the electromagnetic
grid due to macro-particle motion within a time step by solving the continuity
equation of electrodynamics. Being a charge conserving hybridization of
Esirkepov's method and ZigZag, we refer to it as ``EZ'' as shorthand for
``Esirkepov meets ZigZag''. Simulations of a warm, relativistic plasma with
PIConGPU show that EZ achieves the same level of charge conservation as the
commonly used method by Esirkepov, yet reaches higher performance for
macro-particle assignment-functions up to third-order. In addition to a
detailed description of the functioning of EZ, reasons for the expected and
observed performance increase are given, and guidelines for its implementation
aiming at highest performance on GPUs are provided.
