Key Points:
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Ethereum hit a record 24,192 transactions per second (TPS) this week, driven by explosive activity from its new Layer 2 network, Lighter.
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Lighter, a decentralized perpetuals platform using zero-knowledge proofs, has processed 4,000 TPS alone — far exceeding Base’s 100–200 TPS.
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While the milestone marks major progress in Ethereum scalability, frequent Lighter outages highlight ongoing challenges in network stability.
By SKN News
Ethereum just posted a record-breaking 24,192 transactions per second, its highest throughput to date, as a surge in activity from the new Layer 2 scaling solution Lighter sends waves of optimism — and debate — through the crypto community.
Data from Growthepie shows that Ethereum’s network achieved the milestone within the last 24 hours, surpassing all previous records. The spike followed the inclusion of Lighter’s transaction data into Ethereum’s broader activity metrics, giving the ecosystem a clear picture of just how far scaling has come in recent months.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin took to X (formerly Twitter) to celebrate the achievement with a short message: “Ethereum is scaling.”
Lighter’s Rise: A ZK-Powered Speed Machine
Lighter, launched on October 1, is a zero-knowledge rollup-based Layer 2 that specializes in decentralized perpetual futures trading. Its architecture enables parallel transaction execution and near-instant settlement — key factors behind its ability to sustain over 4,000 TPS, according to on-chain data.
That speed dwarfs Base, Coinbase’s Layer 2 network, which averages 100–200 TPS, and even rivals Solana, long touted as the high-performance benchmark among smart contract platforms.
“L2s are now adding a 200x scaling factor to Ethereum,” said Ryan Sean Adams, host of the Bankless podcast, attributing the jump to Lighter’s adoption of advanced zero-knowledge (ZK) proofs. “The big ZK unlock is just starting to hit Ethereum L2s,” he added, predicting Ethereum could reach 100,000 TPS — and eventually 1 million — within the next year.
The record comes on the heels of Ethereum’s Dencun and Pectra upgrades earlier this year, which introduced key data availability improvements and execution optimizations that have laid the groundwork for L2 scalability breakthroughs.
Performance vs. Reliability: A Familiar Trade-Off
Despite its eye-catching performance, Lighter has faced a series of network outages since its launch — drawing comparisons to Solana’s early days, when technical instability frequently overshadowed its throughput achievements.
“Lighter’s outages are an unfortunate echo of the challenges that come with pushing the limits of blockchain performance,” said Maria Ferris, a researcher at Delphi Digital. “Speed is critical for adoption, but reliability and decentralization remain Ethereum’s north stars.”
While Ethereum’s scaling narrative is gaining strength, the growing prominence of Layer 2 ecosystems has also sparked an internal debate over Ethereum’s role as a Layer 1.
As L2 networks like Arbitrum, Optimism, Base, and now Lighter dominate metrics such as transaction volume, DeFi activity, and fee generation, some observers argue that Ethereum’s base layer is ceding economic gravity to its scaling solutions.
“Ethereum is evolving into the settlement layer of a multi-chain ecosystem,” said Lucas Zhao, an analyst at Blockworks Research. “That’s not a loss of dominance — it’s a redefinition of what dominance means.”
Community Reaction: From Pride to Pragmatism
The record TPS figure sparked a wave of enthusiasm among Ethereum supporters online. Posts tagged #EthereumScaling and #Lighter surged across social platforms, with many highlighting that Ethereum’s throughput now surpasses that of even high-speed Layer 1s like Solana and Avalanche — at least in aggregate.
But developers and analysts were quick to temper the excitement with realism. “Throughput is not the end goal — it’s the enabler,” said Anthony Sassano, Ethereum educator and founder of The Daily Gwei. “What matters is how sustainable these scaling solutions are over time and how well they integrate with Ethereum’s security guarantees.”
Lighter’s success — and its technical growing pains — may serve as a bellwether for Ethereum’s future. If it can stabilize operations while maintaining its performance edge, it could prove that Ethereum’s modular scaling roadmap is finally delivering on its long-promised potential.
Looking Ahead: The Road to 100,000 TPS
With Layer 2 networks increasingly carrying the bulk of Ethereum’s traffic, the ecosystem appears to be entering a new phase of maturity. Developers expect future upgrades, including EIP-7732 (“Enshrined Rollups”), to further streamline L2 settlement and reduce gas costs across chains.
For now, Ethereum’s record 24K TPS marks more than just a milestone — it’s a signal that Ethereum’s scaling story is no longer theoretical, but happening in real time.
As Ryan Sean Adams put it, “We’re witnessing the start of Ethereum’s exponential phase. L2s are the engine — and it’s only just revving up.”
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