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Ethereum is only about a month away from its next major upgrade — the long-awaited and highly anticipated Pectra. According to the roadmap, the upgrade should go live on the mainnet on April 30, 2025, following a successful launch on the Hoodi testnet.
Once live, the upgrade will major improvements to the network, such as enhanced efficiency, scalability, and better user experience overall.
What Does Pectra Have To Offer?
Pectra stands to improve a lot of aspects of the Ethereum network, but one thing that ETH users are looking forward to the most is the introduction of gasless transactions. Once ETH transactions stop depending on the gas, users will be able to pay transfer fees using assets other than Ether.
This will grant users greater flexibility, and make Ethereum-based transactions more seamless.
Other than removing the need to pay gas, the upgrade will also increase wallet functionality, and introduce smart contract capabilities to wallets. In other words, users will be able to use passkey support, and remove the need for repeated token approvals, transaction re-signing, and alike.
Finally, the upgrade will also increase Ethereum’s validator staking cap, allowing for greater decentralization and increased security of the network. Boosting the staking limit is expected to encourage broader participation in Ethereum’s PoS mechanism, which would help improve the network’s integrity.
As mentioned, the launch on April 30 was confirmed a few days ago, on March 26, when Pectra achieved full finalization on the Hoodi testnet. This was a major milestone that follows previous testing phases on the Holesky and Sepolia testnets. However, at the time, the update encountered synchronization and congestion issues.
The fact that it managed to launch successfully without similar problems on Hoodi has reassured developers, as well as the broader ETH community that it is ready for the mainnet.
And, while the news of the upcoming upgrade influenced the market sentiment positively, Ethereum’s price performance has actually been bearish in the last two days. In the last 24 hours alone, the coin’s value dropped 7%, from $2,021 to the current $1,884.
