Blast Shuts Down Amid Unsustainable Operating Costs

Ethereum layer-2 network Blast is shutting down due to operating costs exceeding revenue. In a Friday post on X, Blast's team said there's no 'credible path' to making the network economically sustainable. The team asked users to withdraw their assets to Ethereum mainnet as soon as possible.

Blast was founded by Tieshun 'Pacman' Roquerre, the founder of NFT marketplace Blur, which saw significant growth in 2022 and early 2023. However, Blast's growth proved difficult to sustain amid a downturn in the NFT market. Its DeFi total value locked has declined steadily since peaking at roughly $2.2 billion in June 2024, falling by more than 98% since then.

The network will reduce its withdrawal delay to 24 hours, though withdrawals will be temporarily unavailable while Blast unwinds its Lido assets, a process expected to take about a week. Users will have until Oct. 26 to withdraw through Blast's interface. After that, assets will remain accessible, but withdrawals will require users to interact directly with the Blast bridge contracts on Ethereum.