The number of validators on the Ethereum network has reached 1 million
On March 28, Cointelegraph reported that according to Dune Analytics data, the number of validators on the Ethereum network reached 1 million, of which the 32 million ETH pledged accounted for 26% of the total supply.
Venture capitalist and Ethereum advocate Evan Van Ness said the current amount of staking may already be “too much.” Gabriel Weide, who runs a staking pool, believes that too many validators could eventually lead to "transaction failure."
Meanwhile, Peter Kim, head of engineering at Coinbase Wallet, said that while the number of validators is “impressive,” the number is “artificially inflated by the 32 ETH cap.” However, he hinted that this may soon change.
As the number of validators continues to increase, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed a way to improve the decentralization of the network. On March 27, Buterin published a blog post proposing to penalize validators based on their average failure rate.
If many validators fail in a given slot, the penalty for each failure will be higher. Vitalik said this approach has the potential to reduce the advantage that large ETH stakers have over smaller stakers.
