Ethereum Developers Enter Final Stretch for Glamsterdam Upgrade

The Ethereum network is gearing up for its most significant protocol overhaul since the 2022 Merge, dubbed Glamsterdam. Developers are in the final stages of preparations and have started running devnets with the full set of planned Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs). This marks a crucial phase before code hardening and public testnet deployment.

According to Parithosh Jayanthi, a core developer and DevOps engineer at the Ethereum Foundation, this is the last major stretch before shipping to testnets. While no official launch date has been set, the upgrade is targeted for the second half of 2026. Glamsterdam aims to bring substantial future scaling and change several core assumptions about the network.

One key feature is Proposer-Builder Separation (ePBS) via EIP-7732, which would move the current off-chain block-building process on-chain. This will reduce trust assumptions, limit centralization risks, and curb manipulation tied to maximal extractable value.

Another significant proposal is Block-level Access Lists (EIP-7928), which allows blocks to declare intended account and smart contract interactions in advance. This enables clients to preload data more efficiently, improving execution speed, predictability, and optimization potential.