Layer 1 blockchain
Ethereum ticker ETH
Summary
Proof of stake: a validator deposits at least 32 ETH into the deposit contract (since Pectra, a single validator's effective balance can be up to 2,048 ETH). Time is divided into 12-second slots and 32-slot epochs; validators propose blocks and attest to their view of the chain. LMD-GHOST picks the head, and Casper FFG finalizes epoch checkpoints once votes representing at least two-thirds of staked ETH support them. A node pairs an execution client (EVM execution and state) with a consensus client (proof of stake and fork choice). 128
Design
- System
- Layer 1 blockchainThis profile covers Ethereum Mainnet (chain ID 1). Rollups that settle to Ethereum have separate state, fees and finality; they are listed among the scaling options in this profile and profiled separately.
- Settlement family
- Ethereum / EVM
- Scarce resource
- Stake (proof of stake)
- State model
- Accounts
- Finality
- Economic finality
- Who makes blocks
- Validators that have deposited at least 32 ETH; one validator proposes the block for each 12-second slot and others attest.
- Fork choice
- LMD-GHOST follows the fork with the greatest weight of validator attestations in its history; Casper FFG checkpoints finalize beneath it. Weight comes from stake, not work.
Qualifications
- Finality · Applies. Finality here is economic: Casper FFG finalizes epoch checkpoints, and reverting a finalized block would cost an attacker at least one-third of all staked ETH. It could also be described as checkpoint finality; blocks that are not yet finalized can still be reorganized.
- Rollup cells · Not applicable. Mechanism, node, custody and ecosystem cells describe Ethereum Mainnet only; the rollups listed as scaling options in this profile do not inherit them.
Tradeoffs
- Emphasizes
- Decentralization and Security
- Gives up
- Base-layer throughput. High demand on L1 slows transactions and raises gas prices, so most scaling is left to rollups, which add their own operators and proof assumptions.The rollup-centric approach keeps L1 runnable on consumer hardware while moving execution elsewhere. Security of a rollup depends on its own proof system and upgrade controls, not only on Ethereum.
- Full node at home
- Practical at home 23ethereum.org says clients run on consumer-grade computers. Minimum: 2+ cores, 16 GB RAM, 2 TB NVMe SSD (likely exceeded by 2027) and 25 Mbit/s. EIP-7870 recommended: 4+ cores, 32 GB RAM, 4 TB NVMe and 50/15 Mbit/s, higher if validating.
- Throughput claims
- No classified figure recorded
Scaling layers
- Base · Rollup, mainnet 151617
Base documents one active sequencer; batches are posted to Ethereum with blobs as the primary data-availability path, and validators can challenge invalid outputs. Withdrawals to L1 wait through a proof and challenge period. - Arbitrum One · Rollup, mainnet 181920
Nitro sequences and batches transactions, posts rollup data to Ethereum and uses interactive fraud proofs. A single logical sequencer orders transactions: the Nitro whitepaper describes it as a centralized component operated by Offchain Labs, and current docs describe several sequencer nodes electing one active leader. Users can force inclusion through the delayed inbox after a delay (currently at most 24 hours). Withdrawals to Ethereum through the Arbitrum bridge wait at least seven days. Arbitrum Nova and dedicated Arbitrum chains are different networks. - OP Mainnet · Rollup, mainnet 212223
A sequencer orders transactions. Under the OP Stack specification, its batcher submits each batch to a data-availability provider such as Ethereum, and nodes derive the L2 chain from that L1 data. State proposals are submitted to Ethereum and anyone can challenge them during a challenge period of about one week. The Guardian (the Optimism Security Council) can pause withdrawals, blacklist dispute games or revert to a permissioned system. - Robinhood Chain · Rollup, mainnet 242526
Arbitrum-technology L2 that Robinhood documents as using Ethereum blobs for data availability; the canonical bridge applies a challenge period to withdrawals. Public mainnet was announced on 1 July 2026.
Capabilities
| Capability | How it is provided | Notes and sources |
|---|---|---|
| Account abstraction | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Atomic swaps | Independent softwareLimited scope | Garden, a third-party service, settles cross-chain swaps through hashed time-locked contracts: funds lock under a secret's hash and a timelock, the secret revealed to redeem one side lets the other side redeem, and unredeemed funds can be reclaimed after a timeout. Garden lists Ethereum (USDC, USDT, WBTC, cbBTC) among its mainnet chains, its API lists active contracts, and an explorer shows its WBTC contract used in September 2026. The protocol has no built-in swap; no Ethereum Foundation swap tool is cited. Limited: only the assets Garden lists. Contract risk and liquidity were not reviewed. 36373839 |
| Authenticated data publication | Built into the protocolLimited scope | Blob transactions (EIP-4844, since the Cancun upgrade) record a versioned hash of each blob's KZG commitment; nodes accept a block only once its blob data is available and matches those commitments under KZG proofs (by column sampling since Fusaka, December 2025). Nodes must serve the columns they hold for about 18 days; beacon nodes holding all columns return blobs by versioned hash, which readers can recompute. Base's rollup batcher mainly posts data in blobs. Limited: the data then expires, and there is no update mechanism. Blobs make data available; they do not vouch that it is true. 163132333435 |
| Light clients | Built into the protocolLimited scope | Ethereum's consensus produces what a light client checks: a randomly selected 512-validator sync committee signs recent headers, so light clients can follow the chain from headers alone and check the state they request from providers against proofs. Scope is limited: ethereum.org (retrieved 2026-09-27) says none of the listed light-client implementations is considered production-ready yet and that Ethereum does not yet support a large population of light nodes. 25 |
| Native staking or delegation | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| On-chain governance | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Parallel execution | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Payment or state channels | Partial (layer not stated) Earlier definition | ethereum.org documents state channels built on multisig contracts that settle to Mainnet. No specific live channel network was reviewed; rollups are not counted here. 6 |
| Programmable spending | Native (protocol or core-team software) Earlier definition | Contract accounts are controlled by EVM code; ERC-4337 smart accounts and EIP-7702 (active since Pectra, 7 May 2025) extend what an account can do. 478 |
| Protocol-verified messaging | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Reversible transfers or recovery | Unknown | Not yet assessed under the current definitions; the cited ethereum.org and Safe pages describe smart-contract accounts that can add backup keys, recovery rules or multi-owner thresholds (for example Safe), but neither shows a delay or recovery module live on Ethereum Mainnet within the review window, so no value is set. A plain multi-owner threshold does not meet part (b), and no protocol feature for reclaiming, cancelling or delaying a payment was cited. 79 |
| Rollups | Ecosystem software (publisher not distinguished) Earlier definition | Rollups execute off L1 and post data to Ethereum; Base, Arbitrum One, OP Mainnet and Robinhood Chain are documented examples run by separate teams. See the scaling options described in this profile. 615182124 |
| Shielded transfers | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Signed partial offers | Unknown | Not yet assessed under this row's current definition. |
Reading these values
- How this feature is provided
- Built into the protocol, core-team software or independent software says where a feature lives and who can change it. These are implementation layers, not quality: core-team software is not closer to the protocol than independent software.
- Structured assessment pending
- The shared review has not assessed this feature for any chain yet (Account abstraction, Native staking or delegation, On-chain governance, Parallel execution, Protocol-verified messaging and Shielded transfers). That does not mean it is absent, and a chain’s profile may already describe it.
- Unknown
- The review has not established this for this chain under the current definition; the note beside it says why. Unknown is not absent and not a low score. A feature reads “Not present” only when a source shows it is absent.
- Earlier definition
- Payment or state channels, Programmable spending and Rollups keep the earlier definition until the next fact-check. There, “Native” does not separate the protocol from core-team software, “Ecosystem software” does not say who publishes it, and “Partial” does not say which layer.
- Reading across rows
- The list of capabilities is incomplete. Do not read these rows as a chain leading or lagging overall.
Ecosystem & custody
| Product type | Status | Notes and sources |
|---|---|---|
| Automated market makers | Established in the ecosystemUniswap | Uniswap documents onchain AMM pool contracts that hold liquidity and execute token swaps, and its v4 deployments page lists the PoolManager contract on Ethereum Mainnet (chain ID 1). Liquidity depth was not measured; other venues were not reviewed. 1011 |
| Issuer-native stablecoins | Established in the ecosystemUSDC (Circle) | Circle lists natively issued USDC on Ethereum (0xA0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB48). Native means issuer-issued on Ethereum, not a protocol asset; other issuers were not reviewed. 12 |
| Algorithmic stablecoins | Unknown | Algorithmic or hybrid stablecoins on Ethereum were not reviewed. |
| Bridges | Established in the ecosystemRollup canonical bridges (e.g. Arbitrum Bridge, Robinhood Chain bridge), Circle CCTP | Rollups document canonical bridges between Ethereum and their L2. Circle's CCTP lists Ethereum as domain 0. Other bridges were not reviewed. Risk: Canonical rollup bridges depend on each rollup's proof system, upgrade controls and withdrawal challenge period. CCTP is Circle's burn-and-mint protocol for Circle-supported assets (USDC natively, extended to EURC and registered third-party assets; Circle's supported-chains page also lists USYC on Ethereum) and depends on Circle's Iris attestation service. 13141925 |
| Block explorers | Established in the ecosystemEtherscan, Blockscout | Etherscan describes itself as an Ethereum explorer; Blockscout's repository covers EVM networks including Ethereum Mainnet. Explorer views are indexed provider data, not consensus. 2728 |
| Hardware wallets | Established in the ecosystemLedger, Trezor | See the Ledger and Trezor custody entries: both vendors document native Ethereum support in their own wallet apps. 2930 |
Hardware-wallet custody
| Device maker | Status | What users can and cannot do |
|---|---|---|
| Ledger | Native supportSame as native: Yes | Can: Send, receive and manage ETH in Ledger Wallet with a Ledger device Can: Stake ETH through the Ledger Wallet app, per Ledger's Ethereum page 29 |
| Trezor | Native supportSame as native: Yes | Can: Manage ETH directly in Trezor Suite (Trezor Safe 3, Safe 5 and Safe 7 listed) Can: Stake ETH in Trezor Suite through staking partner Everstake Can: Sign with a Trezor from third-party wallets such as MetaMask and Rabby 30 |
Public data
Your AI can request these lookups through the connection. The website itself runs no lookups. Networks: mainnet.
| Lookup | Status | What it covers and its limits |
|---|---|---|
| Address or account | Available | native ETH balance, transaction count and code presence at provider-reported latest state |
| Tokens and assets | Available | paginated Blockscout-indexed ERC-20 and collection/token balances |
| NFTs | Available | paginated Blockscout-indexed ERC-721 and ERC-1155 token IDs with exact quantities |
| Transactions | Available | transaction, receipt execution and provider-relative latest/safe/finalized inclusion |
Sourced developments
Developments: Review overdue Reviewed Sep 26, 2026; next review was due Oct 6, 2026.
Publication date · newest first
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Consensus specifications v1.7.0-beta.2 remained a Glamsterdam prerelease
The consensus-specifications project published beta.2 with Gloas changes and labeled it a prerelease. This is specification progress, not proof that every consensus client shipped support or that any network activated.
- Type:Upgrade
- Proposal:Scheduled scope under review
- Release:Consensus specification prerelease
- Activation:Not mainnet
Sources: Ethereum contributors — Ethereum consensus specifications v1.7.0-beta.2 (external site) · Ethereum Improvement Proposals — EIP-7773: Hardfork Meta - Glamsterdam (external site)
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Geth v1.17.6 scheduled Amsterdam for Sepolia, not Mainnet
Geth released v1.17.6 as a maintenance release and included the October 6 Sepolia Amsterdam schedule plus implementation work. It is one execution client release; it does not establish consensus-client readiness, multi-client Mainnet readiness or Mainnet activation.
- Type:Upgrade
- Proposal:Scheduled scope under review
- Release:One execution client release
- Activation:Sepolia scheduled not mainnet
Sources: Go Ethereum contributors — Go Ethereum v1.17.6 (external site) · Ethereum Improvement Proposals — EIP-7773: Hardfork Meta - Glamsterdam (external site)
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EF Protocol published Hegotá priorities and an opinionated EIP tier list
The Ethereum Foundation Protocol cluster published its priorities and evaluated 62 EIPs proposed for Hegotá. It described FOCIL and Frame Transactions as its headliner commitments and documented a maturity pipeline from research through EIP, prototype, devnet and inclusion stages to Mainnet. This is protocol scoping input from one coordinating cluster; it is not final fork scope, a client release or network activation.
- Type:Roadmap
- Proposal:Proposed ef protocol scoping input
- Release:Research and scoping publication
- Activation:Not activation
Sources: Ethereum Foundation Protocol Cluster — EF Protocol: The Hegotá EIP Opinion Post and Tier List (external site) · Ethereum Foundation Protocol Cluster — EF Protocol: Current and Emerging Priorities (external site)
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Glamsterdam gas-repricing impact guidance identified contracts and tooling to retest
The Foundation reported that scheduled state-creation and state-access repricings could affect a small set of contracts and warned wallets, RPC infrastructure and node tooling to update gas-estimation assumptions. Testing guidance on Platåberget is not Mainnet activation.
- Type:Upgrade
- Proposal:Scheduled for inclusion
- Release:Testnet tooling guidance
- Activation:Testnet only not mainnet
Sources: Ethereum Foundation — Glamsterdam Repricing Impact for Smart Contract Developers (external site) · Ethereum Foundation — Announcing the Platåberget Testnet (external site) · Ethereum Improvement Proposals — EIP-7773: Hardfork Meta - Glamsterdam (external site)
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A public short-term Glamsterdam testnet was announced
The Foundation announced Platåberget for post-Glamsterdam experimentation and warned about tooling with hard-coded gas limits. A testnet announcement is not Mainnet activation.
- Type:Testnet
- Proposal:Selected for testing
- Release:Testnet
- Activation:Testnet announced not mainnet
Sources: Ethereum Foundation — Announcing the Platåberget Testnet (external site) · ethereum.org community — Glamsterdam (external site)
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Protocol work reorganized around scaling, UX and L1 hardening
The 2026 priorities described Scale, Improve UX and Harden the L1 tracks while summarizing Pectra and Fusaka as 2025 upgrades. Roadmap ideas are not activation promises.
- Type:Roadmap
- Proposal:Mixed
- Release:Mixed
- Activation:Mixed
Source: Ethereum Foundation — Protocol Priorities Update for 2026 (external site)
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Fusaka was scheduled with client releases and later confirmed active on Mainnet
The November announcement scheduled activation for December 3, 2025 and listed client releases. A later ethereum.org upgrade page directly reports that Fusaka went live that day. Scheduling, implementation releases and observed activation remain separate evidence.
- Type:Upgrade
- Proposal:Included
- Release:Mainnet client releases listed
- Activation:Activated mainnet
Sources: Ethereum Foundation — Fusaka Mainnet Announcement (external site) · ethereum.org community — Fulu-Osaka (Fusaka) (external site) · Ethereum Foundation — Protocol Priorities Update for 2026 (external site) · Ethereum contributors — Ethereum consensus specifications (external site) · Ethereum Foundation STEEL team — Ethereum execution-layer specifications (external site)
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Pectra was scheduled with client releases and later confirmed active on Mainnet
The April announcement scheduled Pectra for May 7, 2025 and listed execution and consensus client releases. The later ethereum.org upgrade page reports successful activation at epoch 364032. A release list was readiness evidence; the later network record is activation evidence.
- Type:Upgrade
- Proposal:Included
- Release:Mainnet client releases listed
- Activation:Activated mainnet
Sources: Ethereum Foundation — Pectra Mainnet Announcement (external site) · ethereum.org community — Prague-Electra (Pectra) (external site) · Ethereum contributors — Ethereum consensus specifications (external site) · Ethereum Foundation STEEL team — Ethereum execution-layer specifications (external site)
Publication date unknown
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Glamsterdam scope was scheduled and Sepolia activation set; Mainnet had a December target but no activation timestamp
The meta EIP listed proposals scheduled for inclusion and the roadmap called scope frozen but still changeable while the meta EIP remained in review. Sepolia was scheduled for October 6, 2026. A September EF Protocol planning post used December 2026 as its delivery target for Glamsterdam, but did not supply a Mainnet activation timestamp or activation evidence. Testing, specification prereleases and one execution-client release do not prove Mainnet readiness or activation.
- Type:Upgrade
- Proposal:Scheduled scope meta eip in review
- Release:Spec prerelease and one client release
- Activation:Sepolia scheduled mainnet target not activated
Sources: ethereum.org community — Glamsterdam (external site) · Ethereum Improvement Proposals — EIP-7773: Hardfork Meta - Glamsterdam (external site) · Go Ethereum contributors — Go Ethereum v1.17.6 (external site) · Ethereum contributors — Ethereum consensus specifications v1.7.0-beta.2 (external site) · Ethereum contributors — Ethereum project management records (external site) · Ethereum Foundation Protocol Cluster — EF Protocol: Current and Emerging Priorities (external site)
Topics your AI can explain
Your AI can explain these topics for Ethereum through the connection, with sources.
Known gaps
What this profile's review did not establish:
- No primary-source throughput figure with a stated class and window was recorded, so this profile lists no throughput claim and describes 12-second slots instead.
- Typical time to finality in minutes was not recorded from the reviewed ethereum.org page.
- Rollup security maturity (proof systems, upgrade controls, sequencer decentralization) was not assessed here; see each rollup's own profile.
- Only four rollups are listed; other rollups, validiums and zero-knowledge rollups settling to Ethereum were not reviewed.
- No specific live payment or state channel network was reviewed, so no channel appears among this profile's scaling options.
- Algorithmic stablecoins were not reviewed. For atomic swaps only Garden's hash time-locked contracts were reviewed; only its WBTC and USDC contracts were looked up on a block explorer, their code was not audited, and other swap services were not reviewed.
- Since the Fusaka upgrade only beacon nodes that hold every data column must return whole blobs; how many such nodes serve blobs publicly, and archives that keep blobs beyond about 18 days, were not reviewed.
- Validator count, stake distribution and client diversity were not quantified.
- ethereum.org's account abstraction page still describes EIP-7702 as scheduled; the Pectra page records its Mainnet activation on 7 May 2025.
- ethereum.org's proof-of-stake page (updated 31 Aug 2026) still describes a 32 ETH deposit without Pectra's 2,048 ETH maximum effective balance; the Pectra page is the source for the higher limit.
- Light-client readiness relies on ethereum.org's own statement; the individual light-client projects it names (Lodestar, Helios, Geth light mode, Nimbus) were not reviewed.
- The Nitro whitepaper describes the Arbitrum sequencer as operated by Offchain Labs; the current sequencer docs do not name an operator, so the present operator was not re-verified.
- OP Mainnet's current data-availability path (calldata or blobs) was not confirmed from an OP Mainnet-specific source; the OP Stack derivation spec cited is generic, and the Guardian's airgap window length was not recorded.
Sources
Oldest dated source check: Source checked Sep 27, 2026 Next check due Oct 27, 2026.
- Proof-of-stake (PoS) (external site)
- Nodes and clients (external site)
- Spin up your own Ethereum node (external site)
- Ethereum accounts (external site)
- Light clients (external site)
- Scaling (external site)
- Account abstraction (external site)
- Prague-Electra (Pectra) (external site)
- How Safe Smart Accounts work (external site)
- Uniswap Protocols overview (external site)
- Uniswap v4 deployments (external site)
- USDC contract addresses (external site)
- CCTP supported blockchains (external site)
- Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol (external site)
- Base protocol overview (external site)
- Base batcher (external site)
- Transaction finality (external site)
- Arbitrum Nitro whitepaper (external site)
- Arbitrum Bridge quickstart (external site)
- The Sequencer and censorship resistance (external site)
- Connecting to OP Mainnet (external site)
- Fault proofs explainer (external site)
- Derivation (OP Stack specification) (external site)
- Connecting to Robinhood Chain (external site)
- Bridging (external site)
- Robinhood Accelerates Global Expansion with Robinhood Chain Mainnet, Stock Tokens, Agentic Trading and New Suite of DeFi Products (external site)
- Ethereum (ETH) Blockchain Explorer (external site)
- Blockscout repository (external site)
- Ethereum Wallet (external site)
- Keep Your Ethereum (ETH) Safe with Trezor Wallet (external site)
- EIP-4844: Shard Blob Transactions (Final) (external site)
- EIP-7607: Hardfork Meta - Fusaka (Final; mainnet activation 3 December 2025, includes EIP-7594 PeerDAS) (external site)
- Fulu fork-choice specification: data availability and KZG proof check before a block is imported (external site)
- Fulu networking specification: nodes must serve data column sidecars for 4,096 epochs (external site)
- Beacon API: get blobs by block and versioned hash (after Fulu, only nodes holding all data columns must return them) (external site)
- HTLCs (external site)
- Supported Chains and Assets (external site)
- Garden API v2 chains: Ethereum (evm:1) HTLC contracts for cbBTC, USDC, USDT and WBTC, marked active (read 2026-09-29) (external site)
- Ethereum Mainnet token transfers of Garden's WBTC HTLC contract (0xD781a2ab...), including an initiate call and WBTC paid out in September 2026 (read 2026-09-29) (external site)
Report an error
Found something wrong or out of date? Reporting is free, and every chain goes through the same process. Published corrections appear in the public log.
Funding disclosure
Funding disclosures appear here when an upkeep arrangement exists, in the form “Upkeep funded by [name]; verdicts unaffected.” The funder ledger has not been published yet. Neutrality & funding