Solana Eyes 66% Block Size Bump With New Developer Proposal as Network Demand Grows

Solana developers are considering increasing the network’s block capacity by 66% as demand for block space on the most widely used network grows.

A new proposal, SIMD-0286, floats the idea of increasing Solana’s per-block compute limit from 60 million to 100 million compute units (CUs), according to a document posted by core contributors this week.

The goal is to let Solana process more transactions and support heavier apps like DEXs, MEV systems, and restaking protocols without hitting compute ceilings.

"Block limits' primary purpose is to ensure the vast majority of network participants are able to keep up with the network, by restricting the amount of work a leader is allowed to pack into a block," the proposal's motivation reads.

"However, current mainnet traffic is largely not constrained by large block execution times. This proposal aims a substantial increase in block limits to 100 million CUs, in order to provide additional capacity to the network," it adds.

Solana currently produces blocks every 400 milliseconds, with strict caps on how much compute can be packed into each one. Earlier this month, the network activated SIMD-0256, which increased the limit from 50 million to 60 million CUs.

But developer demand has spiked in tandem, raising the need for even more block space. The new proposal would allow validators to opt into the 100 million CU ceiling via a software upgrade, which is expected to go live in a future epoch once it is adopted.

SIMD-0286 only raises the Max Block Units limit, which governs total compute per block. Other limits, such as Max Writable Account Units, stay unchanged.

This means the extra capacity will primarily benefit non-vote, parallelizable transactions such as DeFi swaps or NFT mints, without increasing pressure on individual accounts.

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