Polygon’s Proof-of-Stake (PoS) network is gearing up for a major consensus upgrade with the upcoming rollout of Heimdall v2 on July 10. Sandeep Nailwal, co-founder of Polygon, has described this update as the most technically advanced hard fork that the chain has seen since its inception in 2020.
In response to the announcement of the Heimdall v2 upgrade, the network’s native token, POL, experienced a nearly 10% increase within a 24-hour period, reaching its highest level in a month at around $0.20.
The Heimdall v2 upgrade will replace the original Heimdall client, bringing in modernized validator management systems and enhancing the synchronization of states between Ethereum and Polygon PoS. This shift marks a move from the legacy Tendermint + CosmosSDK setup to the newer CometBFT + CosmosSDK architecture.
Following successful testing on the Amoy testnet on June 24, Nailwal highlighted that the upgrade aims to address technical debt from Heimdall’s previous build, which was based on frameworks from 2018 and 2019. With Heimdall v2, Polygon anticipates significant performance improvements, including a reduction in finality time from 90 seconds to just 4–6 seconds and a decrease in block times from approximately 5–6 seconds to around 2 seconds, enhancing the overall user experience.
Nailwal also emphasized that the upgrade will enable faster checkpoints, enhance bridging security, and set the stage for future enhancements. However, he cautioned about a potential three-hour delay in checkpoint finality during the migration process and advised decentralized applications to increase confirmation thresholds to 256 blocks for added security against rare chain reorganizations.
During the transition, application data, balances, accounts, supply metrics, and past milestones will be carried over to Heimdall v2. Nevertheless, the upgrade will introduce a new chain ID and genesis block based on the final state of Heimdall v1, with no transfer of blockchain history.
Building upon the recent Bhilai hardfork, which facilitated the achievement of 1,000 transactions per second on the Ethereum layer-2 network, the Heimdall v2 upgrade is expected to further enhance the network’s capabilities. Nailwal highlighted that this upgrade will accelerate money flow on Polygon, support faster on-chain payments, and pave the way for account abstraction improvements via Ethereum’s Pectra upgrade (EIP-7702).
Overall, the Heimdall v2 upgrade signifies a significant milestone for Polygon’s PoS network, bringing advanced technical enhancements and performance improvements that aim to elevate the user experience and set the stage for future developments in the ecosystem.