Ethereum: Vitalik Buterin Unveils the Expected Breakthrough in 2027

Vitalik Buterin believes that Hegota, the Ethereum fork planned for 2027, could be the last update based on technologies familiar to developers from 2015. The network will continue to evolve thereafter. Its future transformations will rely more on cryptographic proofs, parallel execution, and formal verification.

In Brief

• Hegota could be the last Ethereum fork based on technologies familiar to historical developers.
• After 2027, Ethereum is expected to rely more on cryptographic proofs and formal verification.
• Parallel execution would allow calculations to be distributed among multiple machines more efficiently.
• Vitalik Buterin also aims for lighter nodes, faster finality, and increased privacy.
• Several challenges remain to be solved, including the cost of proofs and the parallel management of data.

Hegota Would Open a New Era for Ethereum

In an essay published on September 27, Vitalik Buterin presents Ethereum as a system that is gradually surpassing its function as a distributed ledger. "It’s really no longer just a blockchain," he also stated on X, while detailing his vision for the network by 2030.

The co-founder of Ethereum considers Hegota to be the likely last "normal" fork. This term refers to an update whose components would remain recognizable to a developer present at the network's launch. It does not mean that Hegota will be the ultimate evolution of the protocol.

This distinction allows summarizing the main announced changes:

• Hegota is still scheduled for 2027 according to the roadmap cited by Buterin;
• Subsequent updates are expected to employ recursive STARK proofs;
• Automated formal verification will take on a more significant role;
• Consensus will need to become more efficient and withstand future quantum threats.

The final content of Hegota is not yet fully locked in. The Ethereum Foundation had established a process separating the selection of main features, called headliners, from that of secondary improvements. Each proposal must be evaluated based on its utility, maturity, and technical risks.

Cryptographic Proofs Must Replace Repeated Calculations

Today, computers that fully verify Ethereum reproduce the calculations contained in transactions. This repetition enhances security but limits the gains made when new machines join the network: several participants essentially perform the same work.

Buterin wants to replace part of this mechanism with cryptographic proofs. A computer would perform a calculation and then produce a short mathematical proof. Other participants could verify this proof without having to redo the entire operation.

<< At the time, this approach was not viable for one main reason: the missing ingredient was verification >>, he writes about the early attempts at work distribution. The committees used in the old models increased costs, delays, and risks of failure. Zero-knowledge proofs must now fulfill this role more efficiently.

This architecture would allow multiple machines to simultaneously process different tasks. Ethereum would retain on its main layer the operations requiring a common order, such as two transactions attempting to spend the same funds.

Applications Will Need to Better Organize Their Calculations

This evolution would also change the way applications are built. A program grouping all its operations in a sequential transaction could become more expensive than another capable of separating its calculations into independent tasks.

Developers would thus be encouraged to aggregate signatures or proofs before their inscription in a block. Only state changes requiring precise ordering would be directly processed by the blockchain. The rest could be executed outside of it and then verified cryptographically.

For Buterin, decentralization would no longer be merely a constraint accepted in the name of security. It would also allow for storing more data and distributing calculations among multiple participants. It could even improve privacy by masking the origin of certain requests.

The Vision for 2030 Faces Several Obstacles

Buterin envisions a finality between eight and 32 seconds, lighter nodes, and better guarantees of transaction inclusion. Privacy would also cover indirectly revealed data when a wallet queries a server to check its balance. However, these goals describe a future architecture, not the current performance of Ethereum.

Several difficulties remain to be resolved. Zero-knowledge proofs must become less costly and sufficiently secure for large-scale use. The network must also coordinate parallel access to the significant amounts of data held by applications.

Buterin finally acknowledges a structural limit: << Ethereum itself will never have latency comparable to that of servers, but the infrastructure built around it could >>. Hegota will therefore not mark the end of Ethereum forks, but the transition to a generation of updates that is much more cryptographic, experimental, and complex.