Ethereum developers have postponed the Glamsterdam upgrade on the Hoodi testnet due to concerns raised by security researchers about how changes to Ethereum’s gas-accounting system could impact smart contracts. The Ethereum Foundation announced the delay on October 22 after developers had discussed the concerns.
The change has been postponed while the potential implications are investigated, and no new date has been set. A planned increase in Hoodi’s gas limit to 200 million has also been pushed back.
⚠️ It has just been decided to delay the Glamsterdam hard fork on the Hoodi testnet because of security impacts we identified in this blog post: https://t.co/A6rIgIP8zV
We already found 13 real-world examples and are in responsible disclosure with the affected projects.
Please check your contracts as soon as possible, as the EF is determining how many contracts are impacted in which way.Feel free to reach out to us with questions via glamsterdam@chainsecurity.com.
— ChainSecurity (@chain_security) October 22, 2026
The concerns were raised by blockchain security firm ChainSecurity, who published a report on the issue on October 13 outlining potential issues with two proposed Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs), EIP-8037 and EIP-8038.
These changes would alter how Ethereum bills certain operations and utilizes its blockchain database in order to improve efficiency and increase the network’s capacity.
However, ChainSecurity found that the proposed rules could impact the way certain smart contracts written before the update handle failed transactions. Smart contracts are computer programmes that automatically execute actions when certain conditions are met.
Some smart contracts are designed to respond to failed operations by recording the failure and retrying or executing alternative operations. Under the proposed changes to Ethereum’s ruleset, gas used during an operation that is later rolled back could be reused when the action is retried.
Gas is a fee paid to process transactions and actions on the Ethereum network. This means that under the proposed rules, some smart contracts could continue executing error-handling code even after a failed operation if additional gas is available.
While these changes would not break the Ethereum protocol, they could cause unexpected behaviours in some applications. ChainSecurity stated that it had identified 13 real-world examples of contracts that could be impacted and was working with the relevant projects to resolve the issues.
The firm advised developers to review their contracts’ gas limits, retry logic and overall behaviour before the proposed changes are deployed, and warned that some operations could become more expensive under the new rules. The Ethereum Foundation has postponed the Hoodi upgrade during the All Core Developers Execution meeting held on October 22.
Huge upgrade coming! Close to 3.5x more capacity coming on L1 in the next few months, if this last testnet fork goes well in ten days
Quite a bit more room for blobs too.. Stay tuned for more user research on this very soon
https://t.co/jNTEWsTcO3
— Barnabé Monnot | barnabé.eth (@barnabemonnot) October 17, 2026
This means that the proposed Glamsterdam changes are no longer scheduled to be deployed to the testnet and its associated increase to the Hoodi gas limit to 200 million have been postponed. The upgrade had reached another testing stage after it was launched on Ethereum’s Sepolia testnet on October 6.
It comprises changes to Ethereum’s execution layer (Amsterdam) and consensus layer (Gloas), the technologies responsible for processing transactions and managing the structure of the blockchain, respectively, and was set to bring improvements to block building, transaction processing and data management.
The Foundation has asked Hoodi node operators and validators to confirm their software versions and follow updated instructions from their client teams, as previous software releases should not be assumed to be compatible with the postponed schedule.
The postponement only affects the Hoodi testnet: Ethereum’s main network has not been given a Glamsterdam activation date and ETH holders do not need to take action in response to this announcement.
Developers will continue investigating the reported risks before deciding when to resume testing.
The postponement serves as a reminder of the importance of testing before major blockchain upgrades are deployed, since even proposed tweaks to improve a network’s performance must be carefully considered to ensure that applications using the network can function as intended.
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