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Vitalik Buterin is charting a bold new course for Ethereum’s scalability. In response to a breakthrough zkVM demo by Succinct Labs, the Ethereum co-founder has proposed increasing the network’s gas limit by 10 to 100 times—paving the way for real-time zero-knowledge proofs and a more powerful Layer 1.
In response to Succinct Labs’ recent real-time proving milestone, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has revealed ambitious plans to raise the Layer 1 gas limit by an order of magnitude—or even two.
Speaking on X, Buterin congratulated the team led by Uma Roy for demonstrating a full “zkVM” proof system on Ethereum’s execution layer, but emphasized that several critical hurdles remain before real-time proofs can become a reliable on-chain feature.
First, Buterin noted that Succinct’s demo only measured average-case timings; robust worst-case benchmarks are essential to ensure safety under heavy network load. He also pointed out that the current gas limit—approximately 36 million per block—would need to expand by 10× to 100× (to anywhere between 360 million and 3.6 billion) if on-chain real-time proofs are to be feasible at scale.
Energy Efficiency Challenge
Energy efficiency presents another challenge. Today’s proof of stake system requires around 100 kW to generate proofs at demonstrated speeds; Buterin argues this must fall to roughly 10 kW so that individuals and small teams can participate without prohibitive power costs.
Finally, he stressed the need for formal verification of the proving mechanism to give developers and users confidence in its correctness and security.
Ethereum last adjusted its gas limit in February, raising it from 30 million to 32 million units per block for the first time since 2021—an increase approved by over half of validators without a hard fork.
Looking Ahead: As the network continues to evolve, Buterin’s proposal sets the stage for a significantly more capacious and proof-capable Layer 1 in the months ahead.
