Ethereum names post‑Glamsterdam upgrade Hegota

Core developers confirm “Hegota” as the post‑Glamsterdam upgrade

Ethereum core developers have officially named the network’s next major upgrade after Glamsterdam as “Hegota,” signalling a clearer structure for the protocol’s 2026 development cycle. The designation combines established naming traditions for execution and consensus layer changes and positions Hegota as the second of two planned hard forks for 2026 under Ethereum’s twice‑annual cadence.

While the upgrade name is set, the headline Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) that will define Hegota’s central focus has not yet been selected. Developers expect to announce the main EIP early in the year, with a formal selection window targeted for February.

How Hegota fits into Ethereum’s release cadence

Ethereum’s engineering process has been moving toward more incremental, predictable updates. Following multiple releases in 2025, the network is now operating on a roughly twice‑annual schedule for protocol upgrades. This rhythm is intended to make individual hard forks narrower in scope and easier to coordinate across client teams, researchers, and ecosystem builders.

Under that cadence, Glamsterdam—the planned early‑2026 upgrade—will lead the cycle, with Hegota slated to follow later in the year. Hegota is currently in early planning stages and is expected to incorporate long‑running roadmap goals as well as any items deferred from Glamsterdam.

Naming conventions and what “Hegota” represents

The name Hegota reflects the convention of blending execution‑layer and consensus‑layer upgrade names. Traditionally, execution layer upgrades have been named after developer conference host cities, while consensus layer changes have drawn from astronomical or other thematic naming. Hegota’s blended title signals a combined scope that may include both execution and consensus elements.

Candidate features and technical priorities under consideration

Though the lead EIP for Hegota remains undecided, several technical priorities are likely to be central to discussions. These candidates reflect enduring roadmap objectives and practical constraints around development, testing, and client readiness.

• Verkle trees: A leading candidate in conversations about Hegota, Verkle trees are a trie replacement that dramatically reduces the storage burden for node operators. Integration would be an important step toward supporting more lightweight or stateless clients.
• State and history expiry mechanisms: Proposals to prune or expire historical state aim to control long‑term state bloat and lower the cost of running a full node.
• Enshrined proposer‑builder separation (ePBS): Intended to reduce centralization risks in block construction by separating the roles of block proposers and block builders.
• Block‑level access lists: Targeted at reducing state access bottlenecks, these lists can make state reads more efficient for complex transactions and rollups.
• Gas repricings and EVM cost alignment: Adjustments to gas costs for EVM opcodes aim to better reflect underlying resource usage and incentivize efficient smart contract design.
• Execution‑layer optimizations: Smaller, targeted optimizations to transaction processing or gas accounting that can improve throughput without large protocol rewrites.

More ambitious engineering changes—such as significant reductions to slot times—are already being deferred to later cycles where cross‑client testing and wider ecosystem alignment can be achieved.

Why Verkle trees and statelessness matter

Verkle trees are often highlighted because they underpin the broader objective of enabling stateless clients. Statelessness would allow nodes to validate blocks with only a small cryptographic proof rather than holding the entire state locally, lowering hardware requirements and encouraging decentralization.

For many node operators and projects building light clients, managing the continuously growing state size remains a top concern. Verkle trees, combined with state‑expiry mechanisms, would directly address storage growth and help preserve an open permissionless validation model.

Impact on rollups, scaling, and Layer 1 efficiency

Hegota is taking shape at a moment when rollups and Layer 2 scaling solutions are increasing demand for efficient Layer 1 primitives. 2025 saw meaningful progress on rollup capacity and data availability improvements, and those trends are expected to continue into 2026.

Key upgrade items under consideration aim to:

• Improve Layer 1 performance to support higher rollup throughput.
• Reduce centralization pressure by avoiding changes that concentrate block construction or validation.
• Lower the cost and barrier to running nodes, benefiting infrastructure diversity.

Better state access patterns and targeted gas repricings can make the EVM more predictable and resource‑efficient, which in turn eases pressure on rollup sequencers and Layer 2 ecosystems.

Operational concerns: state bloat and node economics

Node operators have increasingly cited state bloat as an operational challenge. The cumulative growth of on‑chain data influences hardware costs, sync times, and the broader economics of running full nodes.

Proposed mechanisms for state expiry, selective history pruning, and compact state representations aim to curb that trend. Implementing these changes responsibly requires deep testing and clear upgrade paths so that data availability and archival responsibilities are preserved for users and services that rely on historical state.

2025 context and market insights heading into 2026

The year 2025 was marked by several material releases that shaped developer expectations and market dynamics. Two notable hard forks delivered incremental improvements to throughput, data availability, and protocol stability. Those releases helped normalize a more disciplined upgrade cadence and reduced the need for infrequent, large‑scale overhauls.

Market data through 2025 reflected growing institutional participation in staking and an expanded ecosystem of rollups and Layer 2 services. However, rising attention to node economics and infrastructure resilience also influenced developer priorities. In 2026, the market will be looking for upgrades that continue to scale the network while preserving decentralization.

Macro factors—including regulatory developments, broader capital flows into crypto markets, and increased enterprise interest in blockchain infrastructure—are likely to influence adoption rates and infrastructure investment decisions over the coming year.

Governance, timelines, and what to watch next

Development meetings at year‑end finalized the Hegota name and left several technical choices open for early‑year determination. Core developer discussions are expected to resume in January, with a formal decision on the headline EIP anticipated in February.

Key milestones to follow:

• Public specification and reference implementation timelines for any chosen headline EIP.
• Client implementation and cross‑client testing windows.
• Community review periods and coordination with major infrastructure providers.
• Security audits and testnet deployments ahead of a mainnet activation date later in 2026.

Because upgrades will be narrower and more iterative, the window for community feedback and client readiness will be more compressed than in previous multi‑phase overhauls. That makes early engagement from ecosystem participants—node operators, rollup teams, tooling providers—particularly valuable.

Outlook for network participants and builders

For builders and protocol teams, Hegota represents an opportunity to align on mid‑term priorities: improving Layer 1 efficiency, enabling broader participation through lighter clients, and smoothing the path for rollup growth. For infrastructure providers, the emphasis will be on integrating any new state representation or access patterns into production systems.

Market actors should monitor:

• Specification updates and the chosen headline EIP in February.
• Testnet activations and client release schedules.
• Changes to gas economics that could affect smart contract costs and DeFi strategies.

Conclusion

The naming of Hegota crystallizes the next stage of Ethereum’s development roadmap for 2026. While the upgrade’s centerpiece has yet to be selected, likely candidates such as Verkle trees and state‑expiry mechanisms reflect a broader push to make the protocol more scalable and accessible for a growing base of rollups and participants.

As 2026 approaches, the community will be watching the February decision on the headline EIP and tracking how client teams schedule development, testing, and rollout. The combination of incremental upgrades, clearer timelines, and focused engineering priorities positions the network to balance performance gains with decentralization and long‑term resilience.

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