Ethereum Glamsterdam Upgrade Nears Completion with Parallelization and Scalability Goals

The Ethereum Glamsterdam upgrade is nearing its final development phase, according to an update from the Ethereum Foundation researcher Toni Wahrstätter. This major overhaul aims to increase transaction processing speed through parallelization and expand network capacity.

Key features of the upgrade include ePBS, which reworks the block validation pipeline, and Block-Level Access Lists, which enable parallelization on Ethereum. These improvements are expected to significantly boost throughput and make it easier for individuals to run Ethereum nodes at home.

The Sepolia testnet fork for Glamsterdam is scheduled for October 6, 2026, ahead of a mainnet launch expected in Q4 2026. Wahrstätter described the upgrade as one of the largest forks the network has ever undergone and noted that the development timeline has been long but justified by the eventual payoff.

Ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin sees Glamsterdam as a bridge to more significant changes, including recursive STARKs, automated formal verification, and highly optimized consensus algorithms designed to make Ethereum quantum-safe. The Hegota fork, planned for next year, is expected to be the network's last 'normal' hard fork.