Buterin Proposes Cypherpunk Extension for Ethereum Over Five-Year Timeline

Vitalik Buterin said Friday he plans to add a "cypherpunk principled" extension to Ethereum rather than replace the existing chain, estimating the transition may take five years though AI-assisted coding could shorten that period, according to a public reply on X. The tightly integrated system would coexist with the current network and gradually absorb core functionality while keeping Ethereum active, aiming for interoperability instead of fragmentation; he cited the Merge as evidence that major upgrades can occur without downtime. Planned changes target censorship resistance, zero-knowledge compatibility and leaner consensus through updates to the state tree, consensus design, virtual machine structure and ZKEVM verification, with each upgrade improving simplicity and cryptographic efficiency. Wallet standards remain under review, with proposals including multisignature defaults and quantum-resistant options; verification tools may speed safe protocol changes, he said, and developers would not need to abandon existing infrastructure.