Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and the Ethereum Foundation are actively considering various approaches to reduce Ethereum’s maximum block size in order to optimize the blockchain for a “rollup-centric roadmap.” The focus on rollups in the medium and long term has led to the exploration of ways to improve block space utilization, particularly due to the doubling of the effective block size over the past 12 months.
In a blog post on February 5, Buterin and Ethereum Foundation researcher Toni Wahrstätter emphasized that as Ethereum’s roadmap increasingly leans toward rollups, the current usage of block space may not be fully optimized. This optimization effort aims to address the growing importance of rollups while ensuring efficient data handling and network performance.
The blog post discusses five potential solutions to increase block gas limits and discourage excessive use of calldata, which, in turn, could reduce the maximum block size, making room for additional data blobs in the future:
The authors acknowledge that the straightforward approach of raising calldata costs to 42 gas might be too blunt, while creating separate fee markets could introduce complexity. Balancing these considerations is crucial to optimizing Ethereum’s block space usage.
In January, Vitalik Buterin proposed increasing the Ethereum gas limit by 33% to 40 million as a means to enhance network throughput. While raising the gas limit can accommodate more transactions per block, it also brings hardware load and the risk of network spam and attacks.
The ongoing exploration of these solutions reflects Ethereum’s commitment to adapting and optimizing its network for future developments and scalability.
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