 
 
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has shared contemporary perception into the position of layer two networks, arguing that the unique imaginative and prescient behind L2s now not aligns with present community realities.
Buterin’s feedback come amid rising debate over whether or not L2s nonetheless serve the identical objective for which they have been designed, particularly as Ethereum’s base layer continues to scale and transaction charges stay traditionally low.
The Ethereum co-founder highlighted two key developments driving this reassessment. First, progress towards totally decentralized stage two rollups, in addition to deeper interoperability, has been far slower and extra advanced than initially anticipated. Second, Ethereum’s layer one is scaling instantly, with low charges at present and gasoline restrict will increase projected for 2026.
Buterin revisited the unique scaling thesis, which outlined Ethereum scaling as creating block area totally backed by Ethereum’s safety, censorship resistance, and finality. Below that framework, chains related by way of multisig bridges or retaining discretionary management weren’t really scaling Ethereum.
Moreover, Buterin famous that some L2s have overtly acknowledged they might by no means transfer past stage one, not just for technical causes associated to ZK EVM security, but additionally as a consequence of regulatory necessities that demand final management. Whereas legitimate for his or her customers, such designs ought to now not be framed as scaling Ethereum itself.
 
As an alternative, the Ethereum co-founder proposed viewing L2s as a broad spectrum. Some might stay tightly secured by Ethereum, whereas others function with looser connections and totally different belief assumptions.
For L2 builders at present, Buterin advised specializing in worth past uncooked scaling, together with non-EVM environments, privacy-focused digital machines, application-specific effectivity, excessive throughput, non-financial use circumstances comparable to social or id, ultra-low-latency sequencing, and built-in oracles and dispute-resolution techniques. He emphasised that any L2 dealing with ETH ought to no less than attain stage one and prioritize interoperability.
From Ethereum’s perspective, Buterin expressed rising confidence in a local rollup precompile that verifies ZK EVM proofs instantly on L1. Such a precompile would mechanically improve with Ethereum, profit from hard-fork protections, and allow trustless interoperability.
Furthermore, it might unlock robust ensures and synchronous composability, permitting L2s to innovate whereas remaining securely related.
