Ethereum Activates Pectra Upgrade, Increases Maximum Stake to 2,048 ETH
Ethereum activated the "Pectra" upgrade, its most significant change since the Merge in 2022, on Wednesday at 10:05 UTC. The update aims to:
- Streamline staking processes
- Enhance wallet functionality
- Improve overall efficiency
The Pectra upgrade allows staking limits to increase from 32 to 2,048 ETH. This enables stakers to manage larger amounts under a single node, reducing the complexity and costs associated with previous requirements for multiple validators.
This upgrade follows two failed test runs, highlighting challenges within the Ethereum ecosystem as it competes with faster-growing alternatives like Solana, which has attracted more developers recently.
Key components of the upgrade include:
- EIP-7251: Increases maximum stakes for validators.
- EIP-7702: Allows wallets to function temporarily as smart contracts, improving user experience with features like transaction fee payments in stablecoins.
Additional improvements from nine other EIPs focus on optimizing operations for validators and enhancing data handling capabilities:
- EIP-2537: Streamlines cryptographic functions.
- EIP-2935: Stores additional block information for easier verification.
- EIP-6110: Simplifies new validator onboarding.
- EIP-7002: Enables direct withdrawal by validators.
- EIP-7549: Optimizes validator vote processing.
- EIP-7623: Increases calldata costs for data availability.
- EIP-7685: Standardizes communication between layers.
- EIP-7691: Enhances capacity for handling data blobs.
- EIP-7840: Configures data handling settings per block.