On September 7, the Ethereum Foundation's Protocol Cluster revealed its priorities for the upcoming Hegota upgrade. Out of 62 proposed improvement suggestions (EIPs), two achieved the highest S-tier classification, denoting them as essential: FOCIL (EIP-7805) and Frame Transactions (EIP-8141).

The Protocol Cluster has published two new posts:

Hegotá EIP Opinion Post and Tier List evaluates and grades all 62 EIPs proposed for Hegotá, providing the cluster’s first unified tier list for a network upgrade.

Current and Emerging Priorities covers commitments and research… pic.twitter.com/GadgBb1xCK

— Ethereum Foundation (@ethereumfndn) September 7, 2026

Additionally, developers have committed to making Ethereum resilient against quantum attacks across execution, consensus, and data levels by December 2029.

At the consensus level, the primary focus will be on FOCIL (Fork-Choice Enforced Inclusion Lists). A committee of validators will curate transaction lists for inclusion, compelling block creators to adhere to the specified criteria for transactions to be supported by validating peers.

This mechanism is designed to enhance Ethereum's resistance to censorship, complicating scenarios where a single dominant builder might block specific transactions.

At the execution level, EIP-8141 Frame Transactions has been designated as must-ship. This proposal integrates account abstraction directly into the protocol, enabling programmability for account verification, transaction execution, and gas payment.

Frame Transactions also offer cryptographic flexibility essential for post-quantum transitions, allowing accounts to adapt to new signature schemes without requiring separate hard forks for each algorithm. This could eventually eliminate vulnerabilities associated with quantum computers, such as those found in secp256k1 keys.

“Safely implementing both key proposals and testing their interactions is the main engineering commitment for Hegota,” stated the Protocol Cluster.

If either of the two S-tier EIPs faces challenges, developers prefer adjusting the Hegota timeline rather than excluding the proposal from the upgrade.

This classification reflects the consensus of approximately 60 researchers and engineers from nine teams within the Protocol Cluster. It marks the first instance where a unified ranking of proposals has been published instead of individual team assessments.

All key proposals are currently categorized as Draft, with technical specifications subject to change during implementation and testing.

Post-Quantum Migration

Several proposals received an A-tier rating, indicating they may be included in the upgrade alongside the two primary EIPs, provided that developers can maintain the scope of the work.

EIP-8369 outlines transaction profiles that could be eligible for FOCIL guarantees. This remains a non-mandatory reference model, with binding rules to be established through separate extensions.

Also in the A-tier are EIP-8250 and EIP-8272, which enhance Frame Transactions:

  • EIP-8250 introduces separate nonces for operations involving a single sender, allowing multiple users to share a common address for increased privacy without interfering with each other's transactions;
  • EIP-8272 enables private operations to reference recent blockchain states in a format verifiable by FOCIL.

EIP-8365 is directly associated with the quantum threat, and the Protocol Cluster identifies it as the only proposal that should be included in Hegota, as its implementation can commence without waiting for a complete post-quantum consensus design.

Ethereum Prepares for Q-Day

The Ethereum Foundation's Protocol Cluster aims to achieve full quantum resistance for Layer 1 by December 2029.

“The timing of Q-day is beyond anyone's control. That’s why we set a specific goal instead of waiting for certainty,” the cluster explained.

The team emphasized that the Q-day scenario for 2030 is intentionally stringent, as most credible forecasts suggest that such a threat would emerge later. Nevertheless, the Protocol Cluster intends to adhere to the December 2029 deadline at least until January 2027, when developers will reevaluate the progress of quantum computing alongside external experts.

The chosen date aligns with the post-quantum cryptography migration timelines set by Google, Cloudflare, and Microsoft.

Developers Must Accelerate Hard Forks

The current roadmap outlines several sequential phases, with Hegota following Glamsterdam. Subsequent updates are tentatively labeled I*, J*, K*, and L*.

Phase I* is expected to introduce a registry of post-quantum public keys. J* aims to provide minimal viable post-quantum protection for Ethereum in the event of an early Q-day. At this stage, developers plan to implement a post-quantum mechanism at the consensus level, along with leanDA data sampling and leanSPHINCS transactions at the execution level.

This serves as a temporary solution with reduced guarantees, allowing the network to continue functioning amid a quantum threat until a full migration is completed. Achieving comprehensive resilience across all three levels remains the ultimate goal.

According to the current version of the Strawmap, the completion of the migration is positioned in L*. However, developers are considering rearranging K* and L*: post-quantum attestations may be advanced to an earlier hard fork, while mandatory zkEVM execution proofs might be postponed.

If Glamsterdam is released in December 2026, and full protection needs to be implemented across five hard forks by December 2029, the average interval between updates would be just 7.2 months.

“Simply releasing hard forks consecutively is insufficient to meet the December 2029 deadline,” the cluster noted.

Consequently, the development of upcoming updates will proceed in parallel: while preparing Hegota, specifications for I* should be advancing, and research for J*–L* will continue simultaneously.

Previously, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin described quantum resistance as a priority that has gained importance compared to the 2023 roadmap.

In July, the Ethereum Foundation released a long-term technological development plan for the decentralized network, targeting completion by 2029.

ForkLog has previously explored the stages of the new roadmap, the necessity for post-quantum cryptography in blockchain, and the reactions from industry participants to the adjusted scaling timelines.