The Ethereum Pectra upgrade is expected to be implemented in the first quarter of 2025. This is the third major upgrade of Ethereum following the Ethereum merge in September 2022 and the Cancun upgrade in March 2024.
During the Ethereum core developer call on January 9, 2025, execution layer technical protocol support lead Tim Beiko suggested initiating the 5th development network (Devnet 5) process related to the Pactra upgrade in the week of January 13, and upgrading Ethereum's public testnets Sepoila and Holesky in February 2025, with mainnet activation in March 2025.
About the Pectra upgrade
The Pectra upgrade includes two main parts: the Prague execution layer upgrade and the Electra consensus layer upgrade. The key proposals in this technical upgrade focus on enhancing account abstraction, optimizing validator operations, and continuing to improve Ethereum network performance, which also includes optimized technical protocols for Layer2, making it a highlight of the Pectra upgrade to look forward to.
The technical protocols related to the consensus layer upgrade include:
EIP-6110, EIP-7002, EIP-7251, EIP-7549, EIP-7691.
The technical protocols related to the execution layer upgrade include:
EIP-7685, EIP-7623, EIP-7702, EIP-2537, EIP-2935.
How the Pectra upgrade improves Ethereum
Implement protocols according to EIP-7600 Pectra hard fork process; currently included in the Pectra upgrade Ethereum improvement protocols are:
EIP-6110: Use internal deposit processing mechanisms on the consensus layer
When validators deposit ETH, there is no longer a need to rely on the voting mechanism of the consensus layer for verification, thus enhancing the security of validator operations. Even with more than two-thirds of hostile staked equity, honest nodes can still cope. Meanwhile, this mechanism can reduce the complexity of client software design and also decrease operational latency.
EIP-7002: Trigger withdrawal from the execution layer
Allow validators to withdraw through the execution layer, with credentials triggering exits and withdrawals.
EIP-7251: Increase MAX_EFFECTIVE_BALANCE
Allow Ethereum staking to exceed 32 ETH, with the minimum staking threshold unchanged at 32 ETH. This technical protocol improvement aims to reduce the number of validators in the network by allowing large node operators to combine multiple validators, thereby lowering peer-to-peer messaging, signature aggregation, and storage burdens.
EIP-7549: Move Committee Index out of proof
Aims to achieve more efficient consensus voting aggregation, reducing validation costs and network load.
EIP-7691: Increase the number of Blobs
Increase the number of Blobs in each block to a maximum of 6 to 9, helping Ethereum improve scalability through Layer2 solutions.
EIP-7685: General Execution Layer Requests
This proposal defines a general framework for storing contract trigger requests, simplifying the addition of new request types without needing to change the structure of the execution block, ultimately creating a more secure system for users.
EIP-7623: Increase the cost of calldata
Since the implementation of EIP-1599, the limit on Ethereum block Gas fees has not increased, but the amount of data released to the mainnet has been steadily increasing, and the average size of blocks has also been growing. Since the implementation of EIP-2028, the cost of calldata has remained unchanged, but since EIP-4844 introduced Blobs, it is necessary to reassess the cost of calldata to reduce the maximum block data size, making room for more Blobs that can help increase block throughput.
EIP-7702: Set EOA account code
Add new transaction types to increase code execution capabilities for EOA accounts, enhancing account flexibility and programmability.
EIP-2537: Precompiled operations for BLS12-381 curve
By introducing precompiled contracts, Ethereum adds support for BLS12-381 curve operations, enabling cryptographic algorithm BLS signature verification and allowing multiple signatures to be aggregated into one signature, thereby reducing validation complexity.
EIP-2935: Store historical block hashes in state
By storing the most recent 8192 block hashes in the system contract, support is provided for the stateless client model, offering more flexible historical block hash queries. These hash values can be queried directly through the contract and provided as a witness bundle to the stateless client.
However, the previously highly anticipated technical proposal EIP-7594 has been paused for over 6 months, and it is expected not to be implemented in the Pectra upgrade. EIP-7594 introduces a Data Availability Sampling (DAS) protocol that ensures Blob data is available even when only a subset of the data is downloaded.
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