Author: Justin Drake, Source: Ethereum Foundation
Yesterday, Ethereum celebrated its 10th birthday.
Today, 'Lean Ethereum' is officially unveiled as a vision for the next decade—also my personal mission.
We stand at the dawn of a new era. Millions of TPS, threats from quantum adversaries...
How does Ethereum find a balance between extreme performance and uncompromising security and decentralization?
In summary: Next-generation cryptography is at the core of winning the offense-defense battle.
Disclaimer: This article represents Drake's personal views, aimed at a broad audience. A deep technical analysis of hash-based post-quantum signatures and SNARKs will be published later. We look forward to and welcome diverse perspectives from protocol layers, the Ethereum Foundation, and community members, which will only make us stronger.
Defense mode—fort mode
What makes Ethereum special is:
100% uptime since genesis
Unmatched client diversity
130 billion dollars of economic security (35.7 million staked ETH × 3700 dollars)—perhaps soon to reach 1 trillion dollars
Ethereum is poised to become the cornerstone of the 'value internet,' safeguarding trillions of assets in the coming decades and even centuries.
Ethereum must be able to withstand all threats: whether from nation-states or quantum computers.
No matter what happens in the future, as long as the internet is online, Ethereum will be online.
If the world is connected, then the world is on-chain.
Offense mode—beast mode
Ethereum remains hungry.
Within the Ethereum Foundation's protocol cluster, 'scaling L1, scaling blobs' has become a strategic priority.
Performance improvements are expected to be readily available in the next 6 to 12 months.
In the long term? Imagine this:
L1 reaches gigagas level (10K TPS), vertical performance limits enhanced
L2 reaches teragas level (1M TPS), horizontally scalable infinitely
The balance between scalability and decentralization? Why not have both?
The 'moonshot-level mathematics' we need has been tamed:
Real-time zkVMs (Lean Execution)
Data Availability Sampling (DAS) (Slim Data)
Adding value: every browser, wallet, and phone can fully verify the entire chain.
Lean Upgrade Plan
Lean Ethereum proposes bold upgrade concepts in three sub-layers of L1:
Lean Consensus Layer
Beacon Chain 2.0
Strengthening extreme security and decentralization
Instant finality
Previously codenamed 'beam chain'
Lean Data Layer
Blobs 2.0
Post-quantum secure blobs
Fine-grained blob size control, providing a development experience similar to calldata
Lean Execution Layer
EVM 2.0
Minimalist, SNARK-friendly instruction set (possibly adopting RISC-V, pronounced 'risk five')
Enhance performance while maintaining EVM compatibility and network effects
These three levels (CL, DL, EL) are reimagined from first principles.
They collectively unlock fort mode and beast mode.
Goal: Achieve ample performance without compromising continuity, extreme security, and simplicity.
Lean Cryptography
Hash cryptography is becoming the ideal cornerstone of Lean Ethereum.
It provides a unified and powerful answer to two major trends reshaping the ecosystem:
The explosive growth of SNARKs
The approach of quantum threats
Imagine the most minimalist cryptographic primitive—the hash function—driving L1 single-handedly:
CL: Hash-based aggregated signatures, upgrading existing BLS signatures
DL: Hash-based DAS commitments, upgrading existing KZG commitments
EL: Hash-based real-time zkVM, upgrading EVM re-execution
In lean CL, lean DL, and lean EL, a gem of cryptography is embedded.
Lean craftsmanship
Lean Ethereum is not just a blueprint for strengthening and expanding Ethereum.
Not just a reinforcement of security, decentralization, and cutting-edge cryptography.
It is an aesthetic, an art form, a spirit of craftsmanship.
Just like Jiro Ono from 'Jiro Dreams of Sushi'—as long as we can do better, we will.
Minimalism. Modularity. Encapsulation of complexity. Formal verification. Provable security. Provable optimality.
These seemingly subtle yet crucial technical pursuits.
Please stay tuned for upcoming articles on post-quantum cryptography, where we will elaborate in detail.
Lean Heritage
After an extraordinary 10 years, Lean Ethereum is a generational commitment:
Keep Ethereum online under all circumstances
Achieve scalability without compromise
Make it worthy of future generations' trust
This is a story about heritage.
We are builders, we are on a mission, we are Ethereum.
I hope you can move forward with us.
