From Glamsterdam to Hegotá: What’s Next for Ethereum After the Scaling Era?
After years of relentless focus on scaling—layer-2 rollups, EIP-4844, danksharding—Ethereum is finally turning its attention to the messy, everyday experience that has frustrated ordinary users. The infrastructure era is winding down, and the next phase is about making the chain feel less like a technical maze and more like a usable product.
The Shift in Priorities
The roadmap is evolving. The recent Devcon in Bangkok, playfully dubbed ‘Glamsterdam’ by some, and the upcoming ‘Hegotá’ (a portmanteau of Bogotá) signal a cultural shift within the community. Developers are now prioritizing account abstraction, smart accounts, and better wallet UX—the building blocks of a seamless on-chain experience. The goal is to eliminate seed phrases, simplify gas payments, and enable transactions that feel as intuitive as tapping a card.
Why Now?
Scaling was a necessary prerequisite. High fees and network congestion made any UX improvement moot. Now that rollups offer sub-cent transaction costs, the bottleneck has shifted to the front-end. Users still grapple with managing multiple private keys, bridging assets, and understanding gas mechanics. This friction is a major barrier to mass adoption, and Ethereum’s leadership recognizes that fixing it is the next competitive battleground—especially as Solana and other high-throughput chains lure users with simpler interfaces.
Key Initiatives to Watch
- EIP-3074 and EIP-7702: These proposals aim to bring social recovery and sponsored transactions directly to EOAs, bridging the gap between simple wallets and smart contract wallets.
- ERC-4337 Adoption: Account abstraction is already live, but mainstream wallet integration is still nascent. Expect major wallets to roll out smart account features by 2025.
- Native Account Abstraction: Longer-term, Ethereum may integrate account abstraction at the protocol level, making all accounts smart contracts.
Implications for the Ecosystem
Improving UX isn’t just about convenience—it’s about unlocking new use cases. Gaming, social, and consumer DeFi have all been stifled by clunky onboarding. If Ethereum can deliver a ‘web2-like’ experience, it could reignite the consumer crypto narrative that faded after the 2021 bull run. Moreover, better wallet security could reduce the billions lost annually to phishing and user error.
The Road Ahead
As we move from Glamsterdam to Hegotá, the focus is clear: make Ethereum invisible. The infrastructure is solid; now it’s time to polish the surface. If successful, the next wave of users won’t even know they’re on a blockchain—they’ll just know it works. That’s the true test of Ethereum’s maturity.
