Ethereum Prepares for Transformative 2026 Upgrades With Glamsterdam and Heze-Bogota Forks

TLDR:

• Glamsterdam fork introduces Block Access Lists enabling perfect parallel transaction processing capability.
• Gas limit expansion from 60 million to 200 million will accelerate Ethereum’s path toward 10,000 TPS target.
• Approximately 10% of validators will transition to zero-knowledge proof verification after upgrade implementation.
• Heze-Bogota fork implements Fork-Choice Inclusion Lists to strengthen network censorship resistance mechanisms.

Ethereum developers are preparing two major network upgrades for 2026 that will reshape the blockchain’s processing capabilities and decentralization features. 

The Glamsterdam fork, scheduled for mid-2026, will introduce parallel processing technology and expand the gas limit from 60 million to potentially 200 million. This upgrade represents a critical step toward scaling Ethereum’s layer 1 to handle 10,000 transactions per second.

The upcoming changes will shift validator operations from transaction re-execution to zero-knowledge proof verification. 

Additionally, the Heze-Bogota fork will arrive later in the year with a focus on privacy enhancements and censorship resistance mechanisms.

Glamsterdam Fork Brings Parallel Processing and Gas Limit Expansion

The Glamsterdam hard fork centers on two key Ethereum Improvement Proposals that will fundamentally alter network operations. 

Block Access Lists, designated as EIP-7928, enables perfect parallel block processing across multiple CPU cores simultaneously. This technology replaces Ethereum’s current single-lane transaction processing with a multi-lane highway approach.

Block producers will create detailed maps showing transaction interactions and state changes for each block. These maps allow network clients to process multiple transactions concurrently without conflicts or delays. 

According to Gabriel Trintinalia, senior blockchain engineer at Consensys, the upgrade provides all state changes from transaction to transaction within the block. He explained the system eliminates what he called the biggest bottleneck by preloading necessary data into memory rather than sequentially reading from disk.

The second major component, Enshrined Proposer Builder Separation, integrates block builder and proposer functions directly into Ethereum’s consensus layer. 

This change moves beyond MEV Boost’s centralized relay system, which currently handles approximately 90% of blocks. The separation provides additional time for zero-knowledge proof generation and validation across the network. 

Ethereum researcher Ladislaus von Daniels noted the system decouples block validation from block execution, making opt-in zkAttesting more incentive compatible for validators. 

Justin Drake from the Ethereum Foundation estimates roughly 10% of validators will adopt ZK proof verification after implementation.

Gas Limits and Censorship Resistance Take Center Stage

Network gas limits will see substantial increases throughout 2026 as the upgrades take effect. Gary Schulte, senior staff blockchain protocol engineer on the Besu client, anticipates the limit reaching 100 million fairly soon. 

He added that delayed execution could enable even higher gas limits. Tomasz Stańczak, co-director of the Ethereum Foundation, projects the limit will double to 200 million following the proposer-builder separation implementation.

Layer 2 scaling solutions will benefit from expanded data blob capacity, potentially reaching 72 or more per block. 

This expansion enables layer 2 networks to process hundreds of thousands of transactions per second. ZKsync’s Atlas upgrade demonstrates the practical application by allowing mainnet funds to trade within fast execution environments.

The Heze-Bogota fork will address censorship resistance through Fork-Choice Inclusion Lists. This mechanism empowers multiple validators to mandate specific transaction inclusions in each block. 

Trintinalia described it as a censorship resistance mechanism ensuring transaction inclusion if at least part of the network remains honest. The planned Ethereum Interoperability Layer will facilitate seamless cross-chain operations among layer 2 solutions, completing the year’s upgrade cycle.