Ethereum's Glamsterdam Upgrade Hits Testnets First
The Ethereum network is set to undergo an upgrade called Glamsterdam on October 6, 2026. However, this date marks a testnet fork on the Sepolia network, not the mainnet launch.
This means that no changes will occur for users' ETH on exchanges or in wallets, and there will be no swap of balances or new addresses created.
The Ethereum Foundation has stated that the real mainnet date is still not fixed, only specifying that it will be in the fourth quarter of 2026. The upgrade process involves three stages: devnets (short-lived developer networks), public testnets like Sepolia and Hoodi, and finally the mainnet.
The Glamsterdam upgrade includes two key changes: enshrined proposer-builder separation (ePBS) and block-level access lists (BALs). ePBS aims to improve efficiency by allowing builders and proposers to work together more seamlessly, while BALs enable parallel processing of transactions, reducing the time it takes for blocks to propagate through the network.