Ethereum will solve the long-standing blockchain trilemma

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said the crypto network is close to resolving the long-standing blockchain trilemma.

In a post on X on Saturday, Buterin said recent upgrades mean Ethereum now achieves decentralization, consensus, and high bandwidth at the same time.

He pointed to peer data availability sampling, known as PeerDAS, and the development of Zero-Knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machines, or zkEVMs, as key factors behind the progress.

Buterin said these changes make Ethereum “a fundamentally new and more powerful kind of decentralized network.”

According to him, one part of the solution, data availability sampling, is already live on the main Ethereum network. The other part, zkEVMs, is production-quality in performance but still requires further safety work.

PeerDAS was introduced as part of the Fusaka upgrade in December. The feature allows Ethereum to process much larger amounts of data without increasing the burden on individual nodes.

zkEVMs are virtual machines designed to work with zero-knowledge proofs while remaining compatible with the existing Ethereum Virtual Machine. The technology has existed for some time but is still considered to be in an early stage.

Buterin said zkEVMs are performance-ready but need additional security improvements before full deployment. He outlined a timeline of roughly four years for their broader use across the network.

He said that once the upgrades are fully implemented, Ethereum’s effort to balance decentralization, security, and scalability will be complete.

Buterin also shared a roadmap describing gradual increases to gas limits and structural changes to the network between 2026 and 2030, with zkEVMs eventually becoming the primary method for block validation.

He said the progress follows more than a decade of work, dating back to early research on data availability in 2017.

The blockchain trilemma describes the difficulty of achieving decentralization, security, and scalability at the same time. Buterin cited Bitcoin as an example of a network that prioritizes decentralization and security but faces limits in scalability.