Following up from Protocol Update 001, we’d like to introduce our approach to blob scaling. The L1 serves as a robust foundation for L2 systems to scale Ethereum, and a necessary component of secure L2 solutions is data availability provided by the L1. Data availability ensures that updates L2s make back to the L1 can be verified by anyone. Blobs are the unit of data availability in the protocol today, so scaling the blob count per block is a key requirement to usher in a wave of L2 adoption for use cases like real-time payments, DeFi, social media, gaming, and AI/agentic applications.

Our work is structured as a series of incremental changes to Ethereum’s blob architecture. To accelerate our rate of scaling, we are expanding from a “fork-centric” philosophy to also ship incremental optimizations in non-breaking ways as they become ready. Thus, we have the following projects tied to both network upgrades, but also the periods in between (“interfork”).

TL;DR

• Fusaka introduces PeerDAS, a new data architecture that allows blob scaling beyond today’s throughput levels from 6 blobs/block up to 48 blobs/block
• Blob Parameter Only (BPO) forks gradually increase mainnet blob count, bolstered by incremental peer-to-peer bandwidth optimizations
• Advanced networking techniques planned for Glamsterdam iterate on the PeerDAS design to scale even further
• Mempool sharding preserves Ethereum’s values as data continues to scale
• Research into the next generation of DAS unlocks an evolution in secure DA scaling

PeerDAS in Fusaka

The first milestone is the delivery of PeerDAS in the upcoming Fusaka network upgrade. PeerDAS introduces data availability sampling (DAS), where an individual node only downloads a subset of the blob data in a given block. Together with randomized sampling per node, computational load is bounded, even as the total blob count increases. As nodes no longer need to download all the blobs in a block, we can raise the blob count without a commensurate increase in node requirements.

Fusaka is expected later this year with implementations in all Ethereum clients. Extensive testing has been performed on development networks (“devnets”) including non-finality scenarios and adversarial “data withholding” conditions. At this point in the R&D process, we continue to harden existing devnets and plan deployment to testnets and mainnet. Barnabas Busa is leading the charge here to ensure smooth progression through the final stages of the upgrade pipeline.

PeerDAS v1.x

We have two prongs of non-consensus changes in our strategy to progressively scale blobs in between the Fusaka and Glamsterdam upgrades: BPOs and bandwidth optimizations. These are additive as better bandwidth utilization lets us leverage resources towards higher throughput.

BPO

PeerDAS introduced in Fusaka sets the stage for a theoretical increase of 8x from the throughput of Ethereum today (i.e. ~64 KB/s to ~512 KB/s). Rather than immediately jump to this theoretical max at the time of Fusaka deployment, core developers have elected for a more gradual increase via “blob parameter only” hard forks. This mechanism lets core developers program automatic increases in blob capacity over time, keeping us on a continuous growth trajectory. Once programmed, BPOs don’t require any manual intervention to activate. In between steps, we’ll monitor the network and react to scaling bottlenecks that may only present themselves on mainnet, paving the way for the next increase. Barnabas Busa along with others on the EF PandaOps team work closely with the client teams to distill the correct schedule to achieve the 8x scaling from today.

Bandwidth optimizations

There’s a lot we can do to more efficiently use bandwidth on the network. Raúl Kripalani along with Marco Munizaga are leading efforts on this network engineering work. A particularly promising optimization is the introduction of “cell-level messaging” which allows nodes to more intelligently query for parts of the samples introduced in PeerDAS. This change reduces redundant communication on the network, and the bandwidth savings can, in turn, be dedicated to the safe provisioning of even more blob capacity. No consensus or execution protocol changes are needed to unlock this milestone, so they can be shipped interfork before Glamsterdam next year.

PeerDAS v2

This project refers to the next generation of the PeerDAS design that affords even more scale while capitalizing on the bandwidth savings realized from pipelining introduced by EIP-7732 (scheduled for inclusion in Glamsterdam). There are further refinements to cell-level messaging and data reconstruction techniques that let nodes more flexibly sample individual parts of blobs so that the core idea of DAS can be expressed in full. These gains, along with the pipelining benefits that allow for more efficient utilization of the time between blocks, set us up to scale beyond the limits of imminent PeerDAS designs. There are many moving pieces, and exact numbers need to be calibrated to both performance of implementations and mainnet analysis as the blob count is actually scaled in a production setting, but this work should give us the final multiples on DA throughput before needing to seek alternative designs.

This batch of updates will go into the Glamsterdam upgrade expected in the middle of 2026. Alex Stokes and Raúl Kripalani are coordinating the R&D here to ensure we can keep scaling blob throughput.

Blobpool scaling

While the benefits of scaling are clear, we must do so while preserving Ethereum’s core values. One of these directly relevant to blob scaling is censorship resistance. The mempool serves as a decentralized network for blob inclusion and directly provides censorship resistance in the face of a centralized builder network producing most blocks on Ethereum. While instances of censorship have improved over time, it is tantamount to the scaling strategy to also ensure the blob mempool scales with it.

Csaba Kiraly is leading work here so we can maintain this critical resource. Current implementations support near-term blob throughput with vigorous research into the best ways to scale the mempool as we get to higher levels unlocked with Fusaka and beyond.

Future of DA

Beyond future iterations of PeerDAS, we have a variety of research directions to keep scaling DA while retaining the security properties of Ethereum that make it unique. Proposals generally fall under the moniker FullDAS with several flavors under active investigation. A key component of these proposals all involve innovations in peer-to-peer networking that allow for a highly diverse set of participants to shard an increasing number of samples while remaining fault tolerant to adversarial actors. Work such as Robust Distributed Arrays formalizes this notion. Other considerations include low-latency inclusion, censorship resistance, and evolutions of the blob fee market to make it easier to get blobs onchain.

Research here is stewarded by Francesco D’Amato and is very active – reach out if you’d like to collaborate!

In June, we introduced Protocol, reorganizing the Ethereum Foundation’s research & development teams to better align on our current strategic goals, Scale L1, Scale Blobs, and Improve UX without compromising on our commitment to Ethereum’s security and hardness.

Over the coming weeks, we’ll publish updates on each work stream, covering their ongoing progress, new initiatives, open questions and opportunities for collaboration. We start today with Scale L1 — expect follow-ups about Scale Blobs and Improve UX soon!

TL;DR

• Marius van der Wijden joined Ansgar Dietrichs and Tim Beiko to co-lead Scale L1
• Mainnet’s gas limit increased to 45M post-Berlinterop, a first step on the road to 100M gas and beyond 
• All major execution layer clients shipped Pre-Merge History Expiry, significantly reducing node disk usage
• Block-Level Access Lists (BALs) are being considered as a headliner for Glamsterdam
• Compute & state benchmarking initiatives are underway to better manage EVM resource pricing and performance bottlenecks
• The path to zkEVM real-time proving is becoming more concrete, with the prototyping of a ZK-based attester client underway
• We are still hiring a Performance Engineering Lead: applications close Aug 10

Geth-ing Serious About L1 Scaling

Scaling Ethereum requires reconciling ambitious designs with engineering pragmatism. To help us achieve this, we’ve appointed Marius van der Wijden as co-lead for Scale L1 alongside Ansgar Dietrichs and Tim Beiko.

Marius’s extensive engineering experience on Geth combined with his commitment to protocol security make him a perfect fit to align our scaling strategy with Ethereum’s constraints.

Together, Ansgar, Marius and Tim have defined a set of key initiatives that will enable us to Scale L1 as quickly as possible. 

Towards a 100M Mainnet Gas Limit

Our immediate goal is safely scaling Ethereum’s mainnet gas limit to 100M per block. Parithosh Jayanthi, closely supported by Nethermind’s PerfNet team, is leading our work getting through each incremental increase.

At the recent Berlinterop event, client teams significantly improved their worst-case performance benchmarks, enabling the recent increase to 45M gas — a first step on the path toward 100M gas and beyond!

Additionally, client hardening has become an integral part of the 100M Gas initiative. The Pectra upgrade rollout highlighted several issues caused by network instability. It is paramount to ensure clients remain robust as throughput increases, even if the network temporarily loses finality.

History Expiry

The History Expiry project, led by Matt Garnett, reduces Ethereum nodes’ historical data footprint. The recent deployment of Partial History Expiry removed pre-Merge historical data, saving full nodes approximately 300–500 GB of disk space. This ensures they can run comfortably with a 2TB disk.

Building on this, we’re now developing Rolling History Expiry, which will continuously prune historical data beyond a fixed retention period. This will keep nodes’ storage needs manageable, even as Ethereum scales.

Block-Level Access Lists

Block-Level Access Lists (BALs), championed by Toni Wahrstaetter, are emerging as a leading candidate for inclusion in the Glamsterdam upgrade. BALs provide several critical benefits:

• Enable parallel transaction execution within blocks.
• Facilitate parallel computation of state roots, significantly speeding up block processing.
• Allow preloading of required state at the start of block execution, optimizing disk access patterns.
• Improve overall node sync efficiency, benefiting new and archival nodes.

These improvements collectively enhance Ethereum’s capacity to reliably handle higher gas limits and faster block processing.

Benchmarking & Pricing

An ongoing challenge in scaling Ethereum is aligning the gas costs of EVM operations with their computational overhead. The performance of worst-case edge cases currently limits network throughput.

By improving benchmarking infrastructure and repricing operations that can’t be optimized by clients, we can make block execution times more consistent. If we close the gap between the worst and average case blocks, we can then raise the gas limit commensurately.

Ansgar Dietrichs leads efforts focused on targeted benchmarking and engineering interventions, informed directly by PerfNet’s comprehensive benchmarking, to identify and resolve compute-heavy bottlenecks. Significant progress has already been made post-Berlinterop, particularly in managing worst-case compute scenarios.

In parallel, Carlos Pérez spearheads Bloatnet: an initiative aimed at benchmarking and optimizing state performance. This involves testing node performance under conditions with state sizes double the current mainnet and gas limits reaching 100–150M, to directly inform both repricings and client optimizations.

Both of these efforts will inform Glamsterdam EIP proposals to homogenize resource costs across operations, enabling further L1 scaling.

zkEVM Attester Client

Today, Ethereum nodes execute all transactions in a block when receiving it. This is computationally expensive. To reduce this computational cost, Ethereum clients could instead verify a zk proof of the block’s execution. To enable this, proofs of the block must be produced in real time, which we are getting closer and closer to.

Kevaundray Wedderburn is leading work on a zkEVM attester client that assumes we have real time proofs and uses them to fulfill its validator duties.

Once the prototype is ready for mainnet, it will roll out as an optional verification mechanism. We expect a small group of nodes to adopt this over the next year, allowing us to build confidence in its robustness and security.

After this, Ethereum nodes can gradually transition to zk-based validation, with it eventually becoming the default. At that point, L1’s gas limit could increase substantially — even go beast mode!

RPC Performance & Hiring

As throughput increases, different node types (execution, consensus, RPC) face distinct challenges. RPC nodes specifically encounter heightened pressure as they serve extensive historical and real-time state requests.

Internally, the EF’s Geth and PandaOps teams are actively researching optimal configurations for different node types. We expect the importance of this to increase in the coming years and want to grow our expertise in this domain.

To that end, we’re actively hiring for a Performance Engineering Lead. Applications close August 10. If you’re as excited as us about scaling the L1, we’d love to hear from you!

BTC Price Holds Steady Within Key Range

The daily Bitcoin chart shows BTC continuing to consolidate within a well-defined range, trading between $103,600 and $109,300. Since reaching its all-time high of $112,000 in late May, price action has flattened, signaling indecision among market participants. The 50-day simple moving average (SMA) is now acting as dynamic support, aligning closely with the $104,700 region, while the $109,300 zone has repeatedly served as resistance, rejecting further upside attempts.

Volume remains relatively low, reflecting a lack of conviction from both bulls and bears. However, despite several tests of the lower boundary near $103,600, Bitcoin has not broken down, suggesting buyers are still absorbing sell pressure and defending the trend. On the upside, any daily close above $109,300 could open the door to a retest of the $112,000 level and potentially new highs.

This tight structure sets the stage for a breakout. Momentum will likely build once the price escapes this zone, especially with macroeconomic uncertainties and geopolitical tensions driving volatility. Until then, traders should monitor how BTC behaves around these boundaries, as a decisive move in either direction will likely dictate short-term market sentiment.

Featured image from Dall-E, chart from TradingView

Vitalik Buterin has announced that Ethereum’s Layer 1 (L1) will be scaled by 10x in the next year.

This comes amidst calls for an immediate L1 scaling amongst the community.

Buterin’s Implementation Strategy

The Ethereum co-founder confirmed the plans during a panel discussion at ETHGlobal Prague.

“My view is generally I think we should scale L1 by about 10x over the next year and a bit based on delayed execution,” he said.

When asked why he preferred a slower approach, Buterin said a year would be the best implementation timeline. While acknowledging that some people are more aggressive and want to skip the pause and commit to scaling 1,000 times right away, he emphasized that he supports a more cautious and structured strategy.

He further explained that this execution depends on upgrades like mobile log-level access lists, networking-level improvements, and distributed history storage.

Buterin noted that after this is done, it would be a good time to “take a breather” and check if decentralization is still strong. During this pause, he suggested a hard fork to fix remaining issues like account abstraction, censorship resistance, VM improvements, protocol simplification, and switching to SSL.

However, he clarified that when zero-knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machines are ready, the network can progress further and faster.

The 31-year-old has also previously supported using partially stateless nodes to help grow Ethereum. This would let the chain validate blocks without storing all historical data, which makes it easier for users to run nodes without needing large amounts of storage.

Calls for Urgent Scaling

After a weak Q1 marked by falling ETH prices and declining on-chain metrics, some key voices in the community have been advocating for immediate L1 scaling.

Top Ethereum researcher Dankrad Feist has proposed EIP-7938, a plan that would raise Ethereum’s gas limit. His goal is to boost the blockchain’s capacity by 100 times over the next four years, which would allow for more activity on the network.

He maintains that Ethereum can still keep its privacy and decentralized features under this plan. According to him, backing the proposal would show a strong commitment at a time when it is facing major challenges.

Meanwhile, Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has said Ethereum might not survive the next decade. He compared its future to that of Myspace and Blackberry, once-popular platforms that eventually lost relevance. The developer blamed “parasitic” Layer-2s for weakening the network’s core.