KEY POINTS

  • "The Merge" is likely to happen in August, as per Buterin
  • If complexities arrive after Ropsten Testnet, it could be pushed to October
  • Ethereum core developer Preston Van Loon gave a similar time frame

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has said the "Merge" would likely happen in August. However, if there are other potential risks, the activity could be postponed to September or October.

One of the most anticipated events of 2022 in the crypto space, "The Ethereum Merge" is a significant step toward the creation of ETH 2.0 and its transition from proof-of-work (PoW) to proof of stake (PoS) consensus. At the ETH Shanghai Summit, organized by ETH Shanghai and Mask Network, Buterin discussed the future of the network and shared the details regarding The Merge.

Buterin talked about "The Merge" happening on the Ropsten testnet on June 8, which he said is "larger than any other testnet we've done before." This event will see a large number of existing test networks that follow PoS consensus move to PoW consensus.

The Ethereum co-founder said that if everything goes well with the Repsten testnet, "The Merge" might happen by August. However, if complications arise, it might be pushed to September or October. Vitalik added that "The Merge" is "severely" close.

"Activating "The Merge" on Ropsten will provide valuable feedback for devs to see how their clients behave through the upgrade in a less controlled and public test network environment," Christine Kim, research associate at investment firm Galaxy Digital, tweeted Friday.

Post "The Merge," the Ethereum network will be able to host a very large number of transactions because the transition to PoS will introduce something called network sharding, which will make the network more scalable. With sharding, the ETH network will be broken into a number of smaller portions called "shards," and each shard will have its own set of account balances and smart contracts.

At the Permissionless Conference in West Palm, Ethereum core developer Preston Van Loon said, "As far as we know, if everything goes to plan, August—it just makes sense. If we don't have to move [the difficulty bomb], let's do it as soon as we can."

He further added that there is a "strong desire to make this happen before difficulty bomb in August."

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