Ethereum to ramp up gas limit as Pectra progresses

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Ethereum All-Core Devs (ACD) held their final call of 2024 yesterday, which offered key updates on plans to raise the gas limit and progress toward the Pectra upgrade. Discussions revealed the community’s ongoing efforts to balance execution-layer changes, consensus-layer coordination and EIP implementation, reflecting Ethereum’s commitment to “build-in-public” iterative improvement.

In a bold but measured move, Ethereum developers are preparing for a gas limit increase, mirroring a 20% rise seen over three years ago. This time, the proposed increase aims for 36 million gas, though significant technical constraints temper enthusiasm for higher thresholds. The primary limitation is the consensus layer’s “GOSSIP_MAX_SIZE,” which restricts validator block transmission to 10 MiB, equivalent to roughly 10.48 MB. 

On the Mekong testnet — used for Pectra fork testing — the gas limit has already increased to 36 million, offering a stable testing ground for network performance under higher limits.

While the Mekong testnet runs stably with these changes, developers cautioned against increasing the mainnet gas limit beyond 40 million without addressing the gossip-layer constraints. Validator clients, such as Prysm, face challenges in dynamically adjusting gas limits, which underlines the need for further development.

An increase to the gas limit does not need to wait for a hard fork but can be signaled by validators in support of such a change. To date, only 16.8% have done so, but the trend is up. Campaigns like PumpTheGas.org aim to build more momentum.

The Pectra upgrade remains a centerpiece of Ethereum’s 2025 roadmap. It’s on track for a Q1 release, with developers targeting a Devnet-5 launch by year-end. Changes discussed on the call include replacing EIP-7742 with EIP-7840 to offer more flexibility in managing “blob counts” — a key element for scaling Ethereum and supporting layer-2 rollups. 

By allowing developers to set maximum and target blob counts independently, the network can balance scalability (by allowing more data blobs) with stability (by maintaining operational safety limits). This separation makes it easier to optimize block capacity without overloading the network.

Additionally, EIP-2537 focuses on gas repricing for BLS (Boneh-Lynn-Shacham) precompile operations, which are essential for cryptographic computations in Ethereum. The proposal adjusts gas costs for specific mathematical operations, ensuring that resource-intensive tasks are priced fairly while removing inefficiencies like redundant operations. These updates enhance network efficiency, optimize resource usage and improve cost fairness for developers.

An EVM resource pricing working group will launch in January. This group will work on harmonizing gas cost calculations across various operations, aiming to improve efficiency and fairness in Ethereum’s fee structure.

EIP-4444, which schedules the rollout of pre-Merge history expiry for May 1, 2025, requires additional testing to finalize. 

The call also underscored the need for clearer validator node requirements, with developers seeking community feedback. A further proposal to redefine “Meta” EIPs as solely process-related could simplify hardfork management. 

Ethereum’s deliberate and collaborative approach to development was evident throughout the discussions. The Pectra upgrade and proposed gas limit increase reflect the network’s ambition to expand its technical capabilities while prioritizing stability.

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