The upgrade is shaping up to be one of Ethereum’s most ambitious since the network’s transition to proof-of-stake in 2022. Jayanthi described Glamsterdam as “probably the biggest fork we’ve had since the merger,” adding that it will “change a lot of assumptions about Ethereum and prepare us for much larger scale in the future.”
Key features include proposer-builder separation (ePBS), formally tracked as EIP-7732, and block-level access lists (EIP-7928).
ePBS would introduce into Ethereum’s core protocol a separation between the entities that build transaction blocks and those that propose them. Today, that process relies heavily off-chain, where there are additional trust assumptions and centralization concerns. By moving the mechanism on-chain, developers hope to reduce manipulation opportunities related to the maximum extractable value, or MEV.
Another important proposal, block-level access lists, would allow blocks to declare in advance which smart contract accounts and data they intend to access. The change would allow Ethereum clients to preload information more efficiently, helping to make block execution faster, more predictable, and easier to optimize.
Beyond those core proposals, Glamsterdam also includes a broad set of gas price changes that could significantly alter the economics of using Ethereum.
“This will greatly change the cost of shares in Ethereum. High-end computing becomes cheaper and state becomes more expensive.”
