Tezos Protocol Upgrade in Paris Boosts Layer-2 Scaling Solutions to Millions of TPS
The Tezos protocol underwent its 16th upgrade in Paris, which was launched on the mainnet on June 5. The primary goal of this upgrade was to enhance the speed and scalability of the network.
A key focus of the upgrade was to ensure low transaction fees on the Etherlink L2 network, which is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine. Following the upgrade, Etherlink now offers a more cost-effective and user-friendly experience compared to Arbitrum and Optimism, according to Arthur Breitman, the co-founder of Tezos.
One of the standout features of Etherlink is its 500-millisecond transaction finality time, with data being posted on the main L1 network in approximately 10 seconds. This is a significant improvement compared to Optimism and Arbitrum One, which have finality times of two minutes and seven minutes, respectively.
Despite the differences in finality times, Arbitrum One and Optimism are still two of the largest Ethereum Layer-2 solutions by total value locked. Arbitrum One boasts a TVL of $19.2 billion, while Optimism has a TVL of $7.8 billion, according to L2Beat.
The introduction of the Data Availability Layer (DAL) in the Tezos protocol upgrade is a key development aimed at increasing network participation by reducing hardware and bandwidth requirements. The DAL will enable Tezos’ Smart Rollups to scale and potentially reach millions of transactions per second in the future.
Tezos rollups have already demonstrated the capability to handle 1 million TPS in a public demonstration in July 2023 through horizontal scaling, as explained by Breitman.
In addition to enhancing scalability, the Paris upgrade also reduced block times from 15 to 10 seconds. This change aims to improve transaction finality and reduce latencies for payments, ultimately enhancing the user experience for decentralized applications built on Tezos.
By achieving faster transaction times without compromising decentralization and security, Tezos is addressing one of the biggest challenges in the cryptocurrency industry known as the blockchain trilemma.
Overall, the Paris upgrade marks a significant milestone in the evolution of the Tezos protocol, paving the way for faster and more scalable solutions on the network.