Vitalik Buterin has scrapped Ethereum's six-phase roadmap for a new blueprint called the "Strawmap," restructuring development around three layers and prioritizing quantum-resistant cryptography, base-layer privacy and AI-assisted code verification. The plan also retires long-planned technology such as Verkle trees in favor of newer alternatives.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has replaced the network's six-phase roadmap, which included stages such as the Merge and the Surge, with a new blueprint he calls the "Strawmap." The plan reorganizes Ethereum's evolution into three architectural layers: consensus, data and execution.
The shift marks Ethereum's official move toward protection against future quantum computers, broader user privacy and the integration of AI tools for verifying code, while dropping several earlier technical concepts. According to Vitalik Buterin: "Ethereum will be quantum-safe. Ethereum will put users' privacy first."
Post-quantum security drives the rewrite
The overhaul responds to expectations that powerful quantum computers could emerge soon, which pushed researchers to rebuild Ethereum's security plans around a post-quantum public-key registry and PQ transactions. Buterin said the roadmap now calls for aggressive scaling in a post-quantum context, using lightweight LeanSPHINCS signatures and "zkzk" cryptographic frameworks.
These changes force trade-offs. Ethereum developers have declared Verkle trees obsolete after years of development, replacing them with Poseidon binary trees built to work efficiently with the math behind STARK proofs. Buterin said some elements were replaced with superior constructions.
Privacy becomes a base-layer priority
Buterin acknowledged that earlier roadmaps lacked built-in privacy tools, so the network now needs first-class attention to strong privacy. Developers are integrating keyed nonces, elements of FOCIL, lean privacy pools and a "wormhole" architecture to enable fully shielded transfers directly at the base layer.
AI takes over formal verification
Rather than maximizing scale for all activity, developers are building specialized mechanisms with more restrictive properties aimed at token transfers, fast swaps and privacy protocols. Buterin said recursive STARK proofs and native rollups underpin this approach, tools that were not mature enough in 2023 for this kind of design.
Ethereum's economics are shifting too: the roadmap now adds short- and long-term futures for gas and blobs, letting large applications buy network capacity in advance at a fixed price and shielding users from sudden fee spikes.
Securing such a densely integrated system will require end-to-end formal verification of protocol specifications, a job Buterin plans to hand entirely to modern AI tools since the codebase has grown too large for humans to verify alone.
Source: U.Today
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