Ethereum scalability received a significant boost this Wednesday with the implementation of the second BPO hard fork. This technical update raised the blob limit from 15 to 21 units per block. In this way, the network allows rollups to group more transactions simultaneously and cheaply today. This move marks the beginning of a series of structural improvements planned for this year 2026.
In addition to increasing the maximum limit, developers adjusted the blob target from 10 to 14. This change is vital because it allows for a more constant data flow without saturating the nodes. Therefore, the network can now store up to 2,688 KB of technical information per block. This expanded capacity is fundamental to maintaining the infrastructure’s competitiveness against other alternative blockchain networks.
On the other hand, the implementation of these improvements has had an immediate positive effect on fees. Market data shows that transaction fees have been much more stable since last December. Thus, the use of blobs is managing to decongest the mainnet in an effective way and lasting. Users of secondary layers are the main beneficiaries of this reduction in operational costs.
Will the network be able to support a gas limit increase to 80 million soon?
Likewise, the developer community is already discussing the next logical step for the main network. Following the success of the BPO fork, raising the gas limit from 60 to 80 million is evaluated. Consequently, Ethereum scalability would enter a phase of unprecedented transactional growth. This adjustment would allow for processing more smart contracts in each block time interval.
On the other hand, investors’ eyes are set on the future Glamsterdam update. This milestone is expected to introduce perfect parallel processing through advanced access lists soon. In this way, the network will go from being a single lane to a multi-lane highway of data. This transformation is essential for the cryptocurrency to maintain its leadership in the decentralized finance sector.
How will perfect parallel processing impact the massive adoption of the network?
However, the increase in storage capacity also poses challenges for node operators. A constant flow of 21 blobs per block could raise bandwidth and memory requirements substantially. Nevertheless, developers are confident that hardware improvements will compensate for this additional technical load necessary. The priority remains optimizing performance without sacrificing the characteristic decentralization of the ecosystem.
Finally, 2026 is shaping up to be the technical consolidation period for the network led by Vitalik Buterin. These successive updates demonstrate a real commitment to the scalability of the protocol long term. In this way, rollups will be able to offer almost free services to end users. The ecosystem is thus preparing for a new wave of high-transactional demand applications.
