The Pectra testnet activation revealed issues in clients with deposit contract configurations changes on Ethereum testnets. While Sepolia's recovery was straightforward and the network has since fully recovered, Holesky experienced extensive inactivity leaks as part of its recovery mechanism. The Holesky network has since then finalized, but the exited validators would take approximately one year to fully be removed from the validator set (¹). While stakers can test deposits, consolidations and all other Pectra features, the size of the exit queue prevents Holesky from being used to test the full validator lifecycle within a reasonable timeframe. To address this, a new testnet has been launched: Hoodi. It will activate the Pectra network upgrade at epoch 2048 (Wed. March 26, 2025 14:37:12 UTC). Client releases that support the

We are pleased to announce that Hsiao-Wei Wang is joining the Ethereum Foundation’s Board of Directors. The current board members now include Aya Miyaguchi (President) , Vitalik Buterin (Founder), Patrick Storchenegger (Swiss council) and Hsiao-Wei Wang (Co-ED). As this transition unfolds, the board will share further updates on its role and functions in the Ethereum Foundation. Stay tuned for more details in the coming weeks.

The Mekong devnet was meant to be a playground for wallet developers to experiment with UX changes and for stakers to gain confidence in the upcoming Pectra changes. The Pectra network upgrade has been activated on the Ethereum Sepolia and Holesky testnets. These networks can now be used to test the Pectra upgrade features. In light of this, we'd like to announce the deprecation of the Mekong testnet on 7th March, 2025. Application and tooling developers are encouraged to use Sepolia to test applications, smart contracts, and other EVM functionality. Its permissioned validator set provides a stable test environment. Alternatively, many local development environments allow for testing against copies of the Ethereum mainnet state. **Stakers and infrastructure providers concerned with protocol-level testing are encouraged to wait for

At 7:29 UTC today, on epoch 222464, the Pectra network upgrade went live on the Sepolia testnet. Unfortunately, an issue with Sepolia's permissioned deposit contract prevented many execution layer clients from including transactions in blocks. The root cause was identified within minutes, and client teams immediately began working on a fix. This issue is due to Sepolia's configuration and could not occur on the Ethereum mainnet. Around 14:00 UTC today, validators deployed a fix that restored the network to normal throughput. All Sepolia node operators must now upgrade their execution layer clients to the versions listed below to maintain network compatibility.

We’re excited to announce that the next Devconnect will be held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, from November 17th to the 22nd, 2025 at the iconic venue La Rural! This year, we are aiming for something bigger than just Devconnect: We want to support an effort that the local community has already started — bringing Argentina onchain. In Buenos Aires and Argentina, we have a city and country that have been leading adopters of Ethereum for many years. Devconnect Argentina is an opportunity for the whole Ethereum ecosystem to support that steady growth and to accelerate it even further, by helping individual citizens, businesses, institutions and governments to adopt and benefit from Ethereum. **Get in touch at support@devconnect.org or on the Forum if you or your

The Ethereum Foundation is thrilled to announce a new leadership structure, welcoming Hsiao-Wei Wang and Tomasz Stańczak as co-Executive Directors effective March 17th. This marks an exciting new chapter in the Foundation's evolution as we continue to support a growing Ethereum ecosystem.

The security of the Ethereum protocol is continually being improved, and one recent effort is the external security review of the Pectra System Contracts. The results of this review can be found in the audits repository, and the TL;DR is that all discovered issues deemed relevant or important from these reviews have been addressed.

My dear Ethereum community, Today, I’m excited to turn the page and share that I will be closing this chapter as Executive Director of the Ethereum Foundation soon and stepping into a new role as its President. This new opportunity will allow me to continue supporting EF’s institutional relationships, and to expand the reach of our vision and culture more broadly. I’m feeling deeply grateful and enthusiastic for what’s ahead, and while I made this decision a year ago, recent events have given me the perfect opportunity to reflect on what truly matters to me. These past few weeks have illuminated something profound about Ethereum — a truth that becomes clearest in moments of tension, when debates arise over the network’s performance or ETH’s market value. Across