'This is not an ordinary update, but a moment when Ethereum finally begins to operate like a modern network.' When Optimism contributor Binji made this remark on social media, the entire crypto community was discussing the same thing: the official launch of the Pectra upgrade.
At 10 AM Beijing time this Wednesday, with the launch of the Pectra upgrade on the Ethereum mainnet, this network, which has been moving forward since completing the 'Merge' in 2022, welcomed another significant iteration. Unlike the 'Merge', which brought structural changes by altering the consensus mechanism and reducing energy consumption by 99%, Pectra focuses on user experience, Layer 2 performance, validator management, and several 'tangible' areas.
A developer remarked during a live stream: 'This marks a substantial step forward for Ethereum in addressing the issue of “usability”.' But as we look back on the technological journey, what specific changes has Pectra brought to Ethereum? Can it truly drive mass adoption? Will the price of ETH rise as a result?
Pectra Upgrade: Making Ethereum 'feel' more like a modern financial network
In the past few years, Ethereum has been rapidly advancing in technological updates: the 'Merge' in 2022 transitioned the consensus mechanism from Proof of Work (PoW) to Proof of Stake (PoS); in 2023, it opened the withdrawal function for staked ETH; in 2024, the Dencun upgrade significantly reduced the costs of Layer 2 chains through the 'blob' data structure. However, this time, Pectra's focus is more on the 'user side': how to enable ordinary users to complete transactions, interactions, and payments with Ethereum more simply and directly.
After the Pectra upgrade, Ethereum users can now bundle and submit multiple transactions at once, reducing the repeated clicking and waiting process of 'transaction pending—confirmation—then operation' from the past. More importantly, **Ethereum no longer requires gas fees to be paid in ETH; users can choose to pay transaction fees with other tokens.** This means that in the future, it will be possible to pay transaction fees with stablecoins, allowing users to 'directly calculate the cost of each transaction in dollars', lowering the threshold of the crypto world where 'units are not intuitive'.
Binji commented: 'The 'Merge' changed how the protocol works, while Pectra changed the user experience of Ethereum.' For new users hoping to use DeFi, NFT, GameFi, and other applications through wallets, this is indeed a significant convenience.
At the same time, Pectra has further expanded the processing capacity of 'blobs'. The Dencun upgrade last year first introduced blobs, providing a low-cost and compressed data storage method for Layer 2 chains, significantly reducing transaction fees on Layer 2. However, as Layer 2 chains gradually became 'extremely popular', previously low transaction fees began to rise again, with some networks even 'returning to pre-Dencun levels'. Based on this, Pectra has doubled the number of blobs that each Ethereum block can process, allowing Layer 2 transaction fees to remain within an acceptable range in the short term.
Jesse Pollak, a developer at Coinbase Base chain, once warned: 'The rate of growth in user demand will exceed the pace of Ethereum upgrades in the coming years.' His team estimates that by 2025, transaction demand on Layer 2 will grow 10 to 20 times. Although Pectra has increased capacity, in the face of exponential growth, it is clearly only a temporary solution.
For operators running validation nodes, Pectra has also brought good news. In the past, every 32 ETH needed to be staked and managed separately; now, Pectra allows up to 2048 ETH to be managed together, significantly reducing the operational burden and technical costs of nodes. This is undoubtedly a major benefit for participants wishing to run validation nodes at scale.
The tug-of-war between 'technological progress' and 'price anxiety'
Although Pectra has brought tangible improvements in user experience, scalability, and validator management, this has not alleviated the market's anxiety over ETH prices.
So far this year, despite Bitcoin and Solana reaching historic highs driven by narratives like 'Trump's election', ETH has remained stagnant. Its highest price is still at $4000 from last December, far from breaking the historical high of $4800 in 2021. Last month, amid market panic triggered by Trump's new tariff policy, ETH even fell below $1500, hitting a two-year low.
A researcher at the Ethereum Foundation once bluntly stated: 'The narrative of Ethereum as 'ultrasound currency' has failed.' ETH originally hoped to achieve value growth by burning transaction fees and reducing total supply, but the rise of Layer 2 and the decrease in main chain gas consumption have undermined this logic. As critics pointed out: 'The technology is becoming more advanced, but the 'fuel value' of ETH has been outsourced to Layer 2, thus weakening its intrinsic demand.'
In fact, this is a major contradiction in Ethereum's technological roadmap: the more successful Layer 2 is, the faster the main chain is 'neglected'; as the gas consumption on the main chain decreases, the logic of ETH price increases becomes weaker.
According to monitoring data from Mlion.ai, since the Dencun upgrade, the daily gas consumption on the Ethereum main chain has decreased by nearly 40% compared to before Dencun, while the total transaction volume on Layer 2 has increased by over 70%. On one hand, Layer 2 businesses are flourishing, while on the other hand, the sustained decline in the 'demand side' for ETH directly affects market pricing due to the imbalance of supply and demand logic.
Fusaka is on the way: The next node in Ethereum's 'self-rescue'
Looking to the future, the next major upgrade that the Ethereum Foundation is preparing—Fusaka—is expected to rectify the 'route'. Fusaka plans to allow nodes to verify data correctness without downloading the complete blob through a 'partial data download + cryptographic verification' scheme, thereby further reducing node operating costs, enhancing decentralization, and expanding network capacity.
Independent researcher Christine Kim pointed out: 'Fusaka may be a key step for Ethereum to find a balance between scalability and decentralization.' But will Fusaka bring more 'scalability responsibilities' back to the main chain instead of completely outsourcing it to Layer 2? There is currently no clear technical plan publicly available.
The new leadership of the Ethereum Foundation has also proposed that 'future efforts will focus more on main chain performance optimization', but when and how this will be implemented remains to be seen.
Leading in technology, lagging in price: Is it a market misunderstanding, or a question of direction?
From the 'Merge' to 'Dencun' and then to 'Pectra', Ethereum's pace of technological updates undoubtedly leads the industry. However, in the capital market, ETH's performance lags behind competitors like BTC and SOL. Is the market underestimating technological value, or does Ethereum itself need to reassess its 'asset attributes'?
This 'technical-market' gap may be the real challenge that the future Ethereum ecosystem needs to address.
In this context, for investors, relying solely on surface-level news may not reveal deeper risks and opportunities. Especially at a stage where technological narratives and price trends diverge, utilizing AI-driven research platforms like Mlion.ai to integrate and analyze on-chain data, news sentiment, and institutional dynamics is essential to capture the most valuable information amidst 'upgrades', 'route changes', and 'development rhythms'.
As Mlion.ai's sentiment analysis and on-chain data dashboard show: after the launch of Pectra, although Layer 2 gas costs decreased in the short term, the activity level of ETH chain transactions actually experienced a decline. The dissonance between price and fundamental data reminds investors of the need for more diverse and comprehensive data support to make more robust judgments.
Final thoughts
Pectra is not the end of Ethereum but an attempt to 'reclaim users'. It makes Ethereum more modern, friendly, and efficient, but whether it is enough to support ETH's resurgence remains a question that needs to be answered through a coordinated effort across technology, ecology, and market.
For investors, when facing a public chain with rapidly advancing technological progress but misaligned market rhythm, **the more important factor is the ability to process information and manage risk.** In this continuously upgrading and expanding 'Ethereum Road', real opportunities belong to those who remain calm in the noise and can see trends in complexity.
Disclaimer: The above content is for informational sharing only and does not constitute any investment advice!