2025-04-03
Ethereum is making much less money from
"blob fees", a type of fee collected from layer-2 (L2) networks.
In the last week of March, it earned
just 3.18 ETH (about $6,000), the lowest weekly amount so far in 2025.
That’s a 73% drop from the previous
week and a 95% drop from mid-March, when blob fees brought in over 84 ETH.
In March 2024, Ethereum introduced the
“Dencun” upgrade.
It moved L2 data to temporary off-chain
storage called "blobs." This helped reduce user costs but also cut
Ethereum’s fee income sharply.
Since the upgrade, Ethereum has
struggled to earn steady revenue from blob fees.
At one point in November 2024, blob fee
income peaked at nearly $1 million a week, but it has fallen sharply since.
Blob fees have sunk to the lowest levels
so far this year, according to Etherscan.
Experts are concerned. Ethereum’s
current system depends on L2s to handle most transactions, and if those L2s
aren’t using the available blob space fully, Ethereum doesn’t earn much.
One analyst said L2 activity would need
to grow over 22,000 times to bring blob fee income back to previous levels.
Ethereum developers are planning more
upgrades, including one called “Pectra” this year, which will change how blob
space is allocated.
For now, the focus seems to be on
scaling and attracting more users — even if that means lower fee revenue in the
short term.
As one Ethereum commentator put it:
“The goal is to scale as much as possible and worry about making money later.”
