Ethereum's big forks
Ethereum is prepping two major network overhauls in 2026 — Glamsterdam and Hegota — with Glamsterdam projected for Q3 2026 and billed to lower gas fees and speed block finalization (openpr.com, The Currency Analytics, Decrypt). (openpr.com) (thecurrencyanalytics.com) (decrypt.co)
Glamsterdam will formally enshrine proposer‑builder separation as EIP‑7732, moving PBS from off‑chain relays like MEV‑boost into the protocol itself. (eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-7732) The fork packages a set of execution‑layer changes called Block‑Level Access Lists (BALs) that are intended to enable parallel block processing by declaring which storage slots transactions will touch. (coira.io/blog/ethereum-glamsterdam-hegota-2026-upgrade-roadmap) BALs are designed so transactions with non‑overlapping access lists can run concurrently, turning single‑lane execution into multi‑lane “perfect” parallel processing and reducing contention for shared state. (blog.quicknode.com/ethereum-glamsterdam-upgrade-whats-coming-in-h1-2026) Hegotá’s headline change is the rollout of Verkle trees, a new commitment scheme that shrinks state proofs and is presented as a key step toward stateless clients and far lower node storage requirements. (ethereum.org/roadmap/verkle-trees) Developers are also vetting state/history expiry and censorship‑resistance primitives such as FOCIL (Fork‑Choice Enforced Inclusion Lists) for Hegotá to tackle long‑term state bloat and inclusion fairness. (theethereum.wiki/news/ethereum-hegota-upgrade-verkle-trees-2026/) The official Ethereum roadmap shows these upgrades slotting into a twice‑annual cadence after Pectra and Fusaka, with Glamsterdam and Hegotá listed as the next major targets in the 2026 schedule. (ethereum.org/roadmap/) Core researchers flag trade‑offs: enshrined PBS introduces new market dynamics and a “free option” liveness risk that could harm block finality under stress, so protocol designers are adding guardrails before mainnet activation. (therelaymag.com/glamsterdam-s-big-bet-epbs-bal-and-the-free-option-fight) (arxiv.org/abs/2506.18189)
