The recent launch of the Dencun upgrade has exceeded expectations, resulting in a significant decrease in transaction fees for Layer-2 (L2) scaling solutions on Ethereum such as Optimism and Base.
Yesterday, on March 13th at exactly 13:55 (UTC), the highly anticipated Dencun upgrade was implemented on the Ethereum mainnet. This upgrade, which is the most significant since the “Merge,” introduced a mechanism to reduce transaction costs on L2 networks.
With the Dencun upgrade in place, L2 networks now have the ability to store data off-chain using a feature called Binary Large Objects (blobs). This data becomes inaccessible after three weeks, eliminating the need for the expensive “call data” solution that previously stored data permanently.
Since the launch of the Dencun upgrade, L2 networks such as Base, Optimism, and zkSync have experienced a sharp decline in transaction fees. According to data from Marcov’s Dune-based tracker, the average transaction fee on Optimism has dropped from $2.44 to $0.068. Similarly, the average cost of transactions on Coinbase’s Layer-2 Base has decreased from $1.212 to $0.196.
Other L2 networks, including zkSync and Zora, have also seen a significant reduction in transaction costs. zkSync’s average fee has dropped from $0.546 to $0.162, while Zora network’s transaction cost has fallen from $0.752 to $0.003.
It is worth noting that the decrease in transaction fees is primarily seen on L2 networks that have implemented the blob feature. L2 networks that have not yet implemented the Dencun upgrade, such as Arbitrum, have maintained their average transaction costs. However, Arbitrum plans to integrate with Dencun improvements in the near future, which will likely result in lower fees.
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