Polygon (MATIC) Braces for New Hard Fork Designed To Boost Performance and Scalability

Blockchain scaling solution Polygon (MATIC) is gearing up for a new hard fork that aims to boost the chain’s performance and make it more efficient.

In a new blog post, the Polygon team says that while the project has achieved many of its targets for scaling the Ethereum (ETH) network, more immediate goals now require the network’s approval before becoming a reality.

According to the team, the new hard fork boils down to two main points: to reduce the severity of gas fee spikes and to address chain reorganizations (reorgs) in order to decrease time to finality. The team says reorgs happen “when a validator node receives new information that shows a longer or higher version of the chain.” As a result, the old chain is discarded to make room for the new one.

The Polygon team says that after the fork, they expect to smooth out the volatile jumps in gas fees currently present on Ethereum.

“The expectation is that the rate of change for the base gas fee will fall to 6.25% (100/16) from the current 12.5% (100/8) in an effort to smooth severe fluctuations in gas prices.

Although gas will still increase during peak demand, it will be more in line with the way Ethereum gas dynamics work now. The goal is to smooth out spikes and ensure a more seamless experience when interacting with the chain.”

At time of writing, MATIC is changing hands for $1.01, up over 5% in the last 24 hours.

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