Ethereum Steps Towards Staking Withdrawals With Successful Testnet Upgrade

Developers move forward with upgrade to eventually allow users to withdraw staked ether from Ethereum mainnet

article-image

Source: Shutterstock / kkssr, modified by Blockworks

share

Ethereum developers successfully launched the Shanghai Capella upgrade on the Sepolia testnet shortly after midnight ET, Tuesday, at epoch 56832

The deployment is a step in Ethereum’s roadmap which, if all goes according to plan, will allow validators to withdraw ether when the update is complete on mainnet.

Ethereum core developers decided in a meeting earlier this month to begin moving to public testnets for the improvement proposal, known as EIP 4895 and agreed to start with Sepolia. As one of two Ethereum test networks with public validators, it’s attractive for developers to run application tests. 

“We quickly agreed that Sepolia should be first, as the validator set is smaller than Goerli,” Tim Beiko, who runs protocol meetings for Ethereum, wrote in a tweeted on Feb. 2.

The Sepolia testnet was launched in October 2021 to address concerns around the Merge, Beiko said. The network was used to successfully test the Merge upgrade alongside Ropsten and Goerli. Ropsten was later phased out in late 2022.

Sepolia is anticipated to become the primary Ethereum test network following plans to sunset Goerli, launched in 2019, which has suffered from issues with the supply of its test-version of ether, GoETH.

“When Sepolia launched, it addressed the supply issue by using an mintable ERC20 token for its beacon chain, rather than SepETH, which allows validators to effectively mint SepETH, post-Shapella. So, that should solve the supply issue,” Beiko added in a tweet. “Unfortunately, Sepolia isn’t open to permissionless validators, like Goerli is.”

The latest plan, according to project coordinators, is to launch a new testnet — Holli — targeted to serve application developers.

Loading Tweet..

The Sepolia deployment comes after developers successfully ran the application on the Zhejiang testnet earlier this month. 

“This will leave more time for tooling [and] docs to be ready for the Goerli upgrade, which will be the last ‘dress rehearsal’ prior to mainnet!” Beiko tweeted.

The Shanghai upgrade plans have been in the works since 2020 when Ethereum launched its Beacon Chain and started the transition to Proof-of-Stake. The Beacon Chain, the original PoS network that ran alongside Ethereum, merged with the network in 2022. Since then, more than 17 million ether have been staked, but users cannot un-stake or transfer the assets until the Shanghai upgrade is complete.

As of now, that remains on track for late March.

Macauley Peterson contributed reporting.


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

Industry City | Brooklyn, NY

TUES - THURS, JUNE 24 - 26, 2025

Permissionless IV serves as the definitive gathering for crypto’s technical founders, developers, and builders to come together and create the future.If you’re ready to shape the future of crypto, Permissionless IV is where it happens.

Brooklyn, NY

SUN - MON, JUN. 22 - 23, 2025

Blockworks and Cracked Labs are teaming up for the third installment of the Permissionless Hackathon, happening June 22–23, 2025 in Brooklyn, NY. This is a 36-hour IRL builder sprint where developers, designers, and creatives ship real projects solving real problems across […]

recent research

Nillion_DeSci_Report_Template.png

Research

Nillion’s Monad Integration is poised to catalyze the next phase of DeSci’s evolution by eliminating key privacy bottlenecks. This synergy allows researchers, institutions, and DAOs to exchange sensitive data and insights securely while managing governance and payments onchain.

article-image

The SEC filed the suit on Tuesday night, alleging that some Unicoin executives made “false and misleading statements” and violated securities laws

article-image

VanEck’s Pranav Kanade told Blockworks that it doesn’t plan to launch a similar fund for other ecosystems at this time

article-image

What the history of global reserve currencies says about crypto’s future

article-image

A memecoin community delivered on a brick-and-mortar pop-up store

article-image

Despite continued disagreements within the GOP about the extent of the spending cuts, Trump said the House is unified

article-image

More crypto IPOs and M&A in the coming weeks could depend on bitcoin’s price, VanEck’s research head says