Ethereum's Pectra upgrade aims to match Solana's speed and UX after a five-year gap.
On March 5, 2025, the Prague-Electra (Pectra) upgrade was successfully deployed on Ethereum's Sepolia testnet, paving the way for its launch on the mainnet.
Pectra will be the latest upgrade since the Dencun hard fork in May 2024, which enhanced scalability and improved the staking experience, among other things.
It will also be the most significant upgrade since “The Merge” occurred back in 2022 — which saw Ethereum switch from the resource intensive Proof-of-Work (POW) consensus system to a more energy-efficient Proof-of-Stake (POS) system.
In this article, we’ll take a look at how this key technical enhancement will reshape the Ethereum network and its position in the layer 1 (L1) landscape.
Pectra Upgrade: Key Features
The Pectra update includes two separate upgrades (Prague and Electra) in a single release, helping to improve efficiency.
It introduces a variety of Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) that are designed to improve the platform’s scalability, efficiency and user experience.
Some of the most important EIPs included in the upgrade include:
- EIP-7742: This enables dynamic adjustment of the maximum and target number of blobs per block, preparing the network for future scaling measures and improving data availability for Layer 2 (L2) solutions.
- EIP-7702: Introduces account abstraction by allowing externally owned accounts (EOAs) to be temporarily converted into smart contract accounts. This will allow for transaction bundling and allow paying for gas fees in ERC-20 tokens. It also enables features like programmable spending controls, account recovery mechanisms and more.
- EIP-7251: Raises the maximum amount of ETH that can be staked by a single validator, increasing it from 32 to 2024. This helps to improve capital efficiency for entities running multiple validators, who can now consolidate their stakes under fewer validators.
- EIP-7002: Allows smart contracts to directly trigger validator withdrawals, offering staking pools and other applications greater flexibility.
- EIP-6110: Moves validator deposit processing directly onto the consensus layer, improving security and reducing wait times for new validators.
- EIP-4844: Introduces "blobs," a new transaction type for temporary data storage, enhancing scalability and reducing L2 fees.
>> Click here to learn more about account abstraction.
Overall, Pectra will be one of the most significant upgrades to Ethereum in recent years, and it will prepare it to handle increased transaction volumes, reduce fees, and significantly improve the user experience when interacting with smart contracts.
It’ll also make Ethereum one of the most advanced and capable blockchains, being among the first to support account abstraction (EIP-7702) for flexible transactions, increased blob capacity (EIP-7742) to enhance scalability, and higher validator staking limits (EIP-7251) for improved capital efficiency.
In particular, it’ll help it compete on a more even playing field with Solana, which has supported native account abstraction since inception almost five years ago.
When Does Pectra Go Live?
As we previously touched on, the Pectra upgrade is currently being evaluated on Ethereum's testnets.
Right now, the exact mainnet activation date for the Pectra upgrade isn't set in stone. It was previously anticipated for early-mid April 2025, but may be delayed due to bugs encountered during the testing process.
Following a recent developer call, it was announced that misconfiguration errors on the Holesky and Sepolia testnets occurred. As a result, more testing will be required.
The Holesky testnet is currently down, but developers have now launched a temporary shadow version of the testnet to enable further testing. Key stakeholders will be able to interact with the shadow fork to test their code before the Holesky testnet is fixed before ~March 28th.
It’s important to note that these bugs were not in the upgrade itself, but in the testing procedures.
How Does Ethereum Stack up in 2025?
Since it was launched in 2014, Ethereum has undergone more than a dozen major upgrades — each of which aimed to either improve its features or prepare it for future updates.
The cumulative effect of these upgrades is an almost complete overhaul of Ethereum over the last decade.
These include transitioning the network to a Proof-of-Stake consensus model, reducing energy usage by 99.95%, introducing proto-danksharing and dramatically lowering L2 transaction fees via data blobs; as well as stabilizing gas fees with EIP-1559.
The platform is frequently criticized for its outdated tech, but how does it stack up to the competition in 2025? Here’s what the numbers say.
Source: DefiLlama
According to DefiLlama, Ethereum currently leads the market in terms of active protocols, with just over 1,300 active. This is more than the next 5 most developed layer 1s combined.
It still lags behind the competition when it comes to transaction fees. It is by far the most expensive L1 in this regard — with an average transaction fee of $0.90 over the last 7 days, compared to $0.013 for Solana, $0.12 for BNB Chain and $0.047 for Avalanche.
When it comes to throughput, most other L1s still have the edge. Ethereum is currently the 37th fastest L1 by theoretical maximum transactions per second (TPS) at 119tx/s. For comparison, Sonic comes in first place with a theoretical max of 396,825 tx/s.
That said, it’s important to note that Ethereum still ranks 10th by real-world usage, as indicated by the actual TPS of the network in real time.
Source: Beaconcha.in
Lastly, let’s take a look at the level of decentralization, as measured by active node count. Based on data from Beaconcha.in, Ethereum currently has over 1 million active validators. For comparison, Solana has just over 1,300, Avalanche has ~1,480, whereas BNB Chain has 45.
As such, Ethereum is currently by far the most decentralized smart platform.
What’s Next for Ethereum?
After the Pectra upgrade, Ethereum’s next big move is the Fulu-Osaka upgrade, slated for late 2025 or early 2026. It brings Verkle trees, a data structure that makes Ethereum faster, simpler, and more secure.
Verkle trees cut the data nodes must store, letting them verify transactions quickly without the full network history.
The net result is a faster and more secure Ethereum that is better able to handle the load placed on it as the most popular blockchain for DeFi, Gaming, RWA tokenization and more.
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