Ethereum developers are gearing up to announce the mainnet launch date for the Dencun upgrade, scheduled for Thursday, February 8. This upgrade is set to introduce several Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs), including the original danks sharding proposal aimed at lowering transaction costs on layer 2.
In a Reddit post dated February 1, Ethereum core developer Tim Beiko shared positive progress on testing the recent upgrade. He highlighted key insights from the All Developer Execution Call (ACDE) 180, where Ethereum developers acknowledged the successful Sepolia fork on January 30 and discussed the forthcoming Holesky testnet upgrade slated for February 7.
Outlined in a blog post by the Ethereum Foundation on January 24, the Dencun upgrade brings significant changes to Ethereum’s consensus and execution layers. This follows last year’s Shapella upgrade on April 12, 2023, which facilitated the removal of Ethereum staking, a move aimed at attracting more institutional investors.
Beiko mentioned that assuming smooth progress, a mainnet fork time will be determined at the upcoming All Core Developers Conference (ACDC) next week. The subsequent ACDC conference call is scheduled for the latter part of the following week.
Christine Kim, vice president of research at Galaxy Digital, indicated an 80% likelihood of the Dencun mainnet activation by the end of March. However, she noted a slim possibility of it going live by the end of February, estimating it at around 40%. The Dencun network upgrade debuted on the Goerli testnet on January 17, introducing various EIPs, including EIP-4844, which introduces raw sharding, a highly anticipated enhancement expected to notably reduce Ethereum layer 2 transaction fees.
