Ethereum’s Glamsterdam upgrade advances with Sepolia testnet launch

Ethereum’s Glamsterdam upgrade has successfully launched on the Sepolia testnet, marking a crucial step before its mainnet activation. The upgrade went live on Tuesday at 1:53 pm UTC, as announced by Ethereum community contributor Pooja Ranjan on X. Glamsterdam is designed to enhance Ethereum’s layer-1 scaling capabilities, featuring enshrined proposer-builder separation, block-level access lists, and improved gas pricing mechanisms.

The upgrade introduces key changes like enshrined proposer-builder separation (ePBS) and block-level access lists (BALs), aimed at increasing the network’s throughput and efficiency. EIP-7732 separates block proposers and builders, while EIP-7928 enforces access lists to optimize state validation. These changes are expected to significantly boost Ethereum’s performance by enabling parallel transaction processing and reducing execution validation time.

Following the Sepolia testnet launch, developers will proceed to the Hoodi testnet before finalizing the mainnet activation date. The Ethereum Foundation has set a 200 million gas limit floor for Glamsterdam, a substantial increase from the current 60 million, which will enhance the network’s speed post-upgrade. After Glamsterdam, developers will start working on the next major upgrade, Hegotá, which includes proposals to introduce more privacy capabilities into the protocol.