Ethereum network upgrades come in different shapes and sizes, and some generate more excitement than others. Pectra is definitely on the buzzier side, and it's going live this Wednesday:
The Pectra network upgrade is scheduled to activate on the Ethereum mainnet on May 07, 2025 at epoch 364032 (10:05:11 UTC)!
The buzz is largely related to EIP-7702, which lets Externally Owned Accounts (EOAs) specify a delegation address whose code it wants to execute. All subsequent code executing operations then load and execute the code at the delegation address, so the EOA behaves like a smart account (which means potential for transaction batching, gas sponsorship, account permissions, recovery mechanisms and more).
I last wrote about 7702 in December, so it's exciting to see it on the verge of mainnet!
Everyone is (rightfully) excited about this upgrade, but EIP-7702 itself is just a protocol primitive, and changes are required across the stack for end-users to benefit from this new capability.
I'm currently working on an Optimism Foundation mission to support adoption of 7702. Watch out for demos, docs and dapps, and if you're working on anything related to 7702 I would love to chat (@azacharyf on X, azf on Farcaster)!