Ethereum could see another rise in transaction speed in January, with developers considering raising the gas limit to 80 million after the next blob parameter only hard fork.
Ethereum developers are preparing another boost to the network’s transaction capacity, with plans to raise the gas limit from 60 million to 80 million as early as January.
Christine Kim, vice president of research at Galaxy Digital, shared highlights from Monday’s Ethereum All Core Developers call. During the meeting, representatives from Nethermind said the network should be ready for a gas limit increase shortly after the upcoming BPO hard fork scheduled for Jan. 7.
Not everyone is ready to move immediately, though. Ethereum Foundation developer operations engineer Barnabas Busa cautioned that two key client-side upgrades still need to be completed first. These include partial blob responses on the execution layer and enabling the max blobs flag on the consensus layer.
Why the gas limit matters
Raising Ethereum’s gas limit allows more transactions and smart contract operations to fit into each block. This increases overall throughput and can help reduce transaction fees during periods of high demand.
While an 80 million gas limit won’t put Ethereum on par with high-speed, low-cost layer-1 networks like Solana or Sui, it does reinforce Ethereum’s role as a secure and reliable settlement and execution layer. Importantly, developers believe this can be done without meaningfully sacrificing decentralization — one of Ethereum’s biggest strengths.
Decision expected early January
Ethereum core developers are set to meet again on Jan. 5 to confirm the timing of the gas limit increase following the second BPO hard fork.
The first BPO hard fork, which went live on Dec. 9, increased blob capacity by 66%. The second upgrade on Jan. 7 is expected to add another 66% increase.
Blobs are large data containers used to store transaction and rollup data off-chain. They help lower gas costs and improve scalability without adding long-term strain to the network.
A year of steady gas limit increases
Expanding Ethereum’s execution capacity has been a major focus for developers throughout the year, with the gas limit raised three times already.
In early February, it increased from 30 million to 35 million. A second bump in July pushed it to 45 million, followed by a third increase in late November that brought it to 60 million.
Looking ahead, members of the Ethereum developer and research community have shared a longer-term goal of raising the gas limit to as high as 180 million by the end of 2026.
