World Chain will introduce full block access lists to its mainnet on 17 August, becoming the first production layer-2 network to stream EIP-7928 data through every flashblock at 200-millisecond intervals.
The upgrade is designed to allow validators to check transactions in parallel while blocks are still being assembled. World Chain says the system could support throughput of up to one gigagas per second without increasing the hardware requirements for independent validators.
Under the new system, validators will no longer need to re-execute every transaction in a block sequentially to confirm its validity. Instead, full block access lists will record the account and storage data read or changed by each transaction.
That information enables transactions without dependencies on one another to be processed simultaneously across multiple CPU cores. World Chain says the approach could improve performance while keeping participation in network verification accessible to independent operators.
The network is extending the EIP-7928 specification by sending access-list information through its flashblock architecture every 200 milliseconds. Validators can therefore begin checking transactions as soon as they are added to an unfinished block, rather than waiting for the entire block-building process to end.
That is intended to reduce verification latency and spread the computational workload more evenly during block construction.
How the upgrade works
EIP-7928 is an Ethereum upgrade proposal that introduces Block-Level Access Lists, known as BALs. The lists are consensus-verified records of every account and storage slot affected during the execution of a block.
By describing all state reads and writes explicitly, BALs allow blockchain clients to identify dependencies in advance. Clients can then schedule suitable transactions for parallel execution instead of discovering those relationships while processing the block.
World Chain’s implementation will be activated using a runtime flag. This means client operators can update their software before the mainnet launch without having to coordinate a network-wide hard fork.
Ethereum is expected to adopt EIP-7928 as part of its planned Glamsterdam upgrade, but World Chain is deploying the technology ahead of that implementation on a production layer-2 network.
Internal tests carried out across World Chain’s networks found that validation latency remained stable even as throughput rose sharply. The tests reached one gigagas per second using standard cloud infrastructure.
The results indicate that blockchain networks could increase the volume of transactions they process without requiring a proportional rise in the computing power needed to verify the chain.
World Chain described the launch as the first production deployment of streamed EIP-7928 block access lists. It also forms part of Ethereum’s broader plans to improve scalability while retaining the ability of independent validators to participate.
World Foundation recently raised $52.5m through a strategic WLD token sale led by Pantera Capital, with participation from Bain Capital.
