Ethereum’s Pectra Upgrade Delayed Following Testing Hitches

Ethereum network contributors decided to postpone the launch of Pectra, its latest major upgrade, after multiple issues arose on testnet deployments.

Pectra, which will be the network’s largest upgrade since the 2022 move to proof-of-stake, will now continue testing on a “shadow fork” of the Holesky testnet, developers said on a conference call Thursday. The upgrade previously experienced finality issues when deployed to Holesky, which will need a few more weeks to reach finality and become usable again.

The shadow fork is designed to operate as a stopgap duplicate network, allowing tests of Pectra to continue instead of waiting for the actual Holesky testnet to reach finality later this month. Developers expect that the shadow fork is something they could have up and running as early as next week.

“Presumably we can get all the infrastructure and things we need up sooner than Holesky will finalize,” said Ethereum Foundation researcher Alex Stokes. “That way we can keep moving forward on Pectra and not add another couple weeks of delay just because of the status of Holesky.” 

It’s expected that the shadow fork will be spun down around a week after Holesky meets finality, though Stokes indicated they could revisit that as they get closer. 

As for the mainnet upgrade timeline, developers conceded that it remains up in the air. 

“We need more information about how Holesky goes, how the shadow fork goes, before we can set a concrete date,” Stokes concluded.

The upgrade also hit a snag on Ethereum’s Sepolia testnet on Wednesday due to an error with custom deposit contracts. The issue was later identified and fixed, and Sepolia was running normally. 

Pectra aims to bring a handful of anticipated features to Ethereum’s mainnet in two separate phases. Phase 1, which initially was expected to launch in mid-March, will include a limit increase for staking and introduce account abstraction, allowing users to pay gas fees using stablecoins like DAI or USDC. 

Ethereum (ETH) is down 1% in the last 24 hours, trading just above $2,200.

Edited by Andrew Hayward