Ethereum Glamsterdam Upgrade Passes Dry Run, Set to Launch on Sepolia on October 6

Ethereum's Glamsterdam upgrade continued confirming blocks this week after adopting new block construction rules, passing key tests and paving the way for its planned launch on the Sepolia public testnet on October 6. The Nethermind client subsequently completed performance tests involving one of Glamsterdam's biggest changes, with all 2,302 tests passing, processing 570.7 billion gas in 3 minutes and 15 seconds, averaging approximately 2.9 billion gas per second. This benchmark measures the speed of Nethermind's execution software rather than the entire network, testing block-level access lists. This mechanism informs Ethereum nodes which accounts and storage data a block will use before processing, enabling nodes to fetch data simultaneously and check unrelated transactions, whereas current Ethereum mostly processes related work sequentially, limiting the amount of activity each block can accommodate. About an hour after going live on the testnet, Glamsterdam raised the block gas limit from 60 million to 200 million, creating more room for payments, token swaps, and other activities per block. The 200 million gas limit allows Ethereum to absorb more activity before users begin bidding for block space, thereby mitigating fee spikes during transaction surges or hot token launches. Larger blocks are also harder to verify, which could make it difficult for smaller operators to keep up, and Glamsterdam aims to gain additional capacity without making chain operation costs prohibitive. The upgrade also extends block data propagation time from approximately 2 seconds to 9 seconds, and plans to incorporate the handoff and payment between block construction and validation into Ethereum's own rules, reducing reliance on external relay services.