Ethereum Will Make Big Changes To Its Account Abstraction Standard

The Ethereum Foundation plans to implement significant alterations to the account abstraction standard within Ethereum to minimize gas consumption, particularly for layer-2 solutions. On January 10th, 2024, a sneak peek of the substantial amendments to the ERC-4337 standard specification was revealed by the Ethereum Foundation. This specification addresses account abstraction, also recognized as smart accounts.

Streamlining The Process

The upcoming version 0.7 incorporates insights gathered over nine months of utilizing ERC-4337, as outlined by developer John Rising. The most notable modification pertains to the structure of account abstraction transactions, which are more intricate than typical Ethereum transactions. Now, these transactions necessitate the specification of five gas values instead of just one.

Rising clarified that the user has to designate multiple gas values to accommodate the fact that an account can perform computations while its signature is being verified. Rising further expounded on the rationale behind requiring more gas values. With smart accounts, he added, users can employ various signature types and pay for gas in diverse ways. Consequently, the gas required varies, and the transaction must delineate the amount willing to be spent for this validation.

Other Important Details

The updated specification will also impose a 10% penalty on users for all unused gas during execution, preventing apps when it comes to submitting transactions with unnecessarily high gas limits. Account abstraction, or smart accounts, extends the capabilities of basic Ethereum accounts by enabling them to possess programmable logic and rules, unlocking various use cases unattainable with conventional accounts.

While current Ethereum accounts are somewhat inert and fixed, account abstraction empowers them to become active and programmable. Proposed in September 2021 through EIP-4337 by Vitalik Buterin and other developers, the Ethereum Foundation has not disclosed a specific release date for version v0.7 but indicated that the security audit is commencing. Rising speculated that everything should be finalized by ETH Denver at the end of February this year.