Vitalik Calls for Ethereum to "Declutter": Introducing a "Garbage Collection" Mechanism to Address Protocol Bloat

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin posted on social platform X, issuing a clear warning about the increasing complexity of the Ethereum protocol. He proposed that continuously stacking new features to meet specific needs is making the protocol bloated and could undermine its long-term reliance on trustlessness and self-sovereignty. To address this, he called for the introduction of a clear “simplification” or “garbage collection” mechanism in Ethereum’s development process to systematically clean up redundant code and outdated features.

The Cost of Complexity

Vitalik Buterin’s core argument is that simplicity in the protocol is key to achieving “trustlessness,” “exit testing,” and “autonomy,” a point that has been underestimated for a long time. He paints a cautionary picture: even if a protocol has hundreds of thousands of nodes and strong fault tolerance, if it is essentially a “clumsy collection” of tens of thousands of lines of code and complex cryptography, it will ultimately fail. The risks brought by this complexity are concrete and multifaceted. It first undermines the foundation of “trustlessness.” When a system becomes so complex that only a few experts (whom Buterin calls “high priests”) can fully understand it, ordinary users are effectively forced to trust these authorities’ explanations, which runs counter to the original intent of decentralization.

Second, it cannot pass the “walkaway test”: if the core development team leaves, it will be nearly impossible for a new team to rebuild the same secure, high-quality client software within a reasonable timeframe. Finally, it erodes “self-sovereignty,” because even highly capable users cannot independently verify and understand the entire system, meaning the system does not fully belong to its users.

Garbage Collection: Ethereum’s “Slimming” Plan

Faced with the inevitable “bloat” that comes with time, Buterin’s prescription is to establish a formal “simplification” or “garbage collection” feature.

Its core goal is clear: reduce total code size, decrease reliance on complex cryptographic primitives, and add more “invariants”—fixed rules that make client behavior more predictable and easier to implement. This cleanup work is not just theoretical; it can be carried out in a scattered or large-scale manner.

Historically, Ethereum’s shift from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake was a successful large-scale “garbage collection” practice, fundamentally resetting the network’s security model. In the future, a feasible approach is to adopt a “Rosetta-style backward compatibility” strategy, downgrading those complex but rarely used features from the core protocol to smart contract code, so that new client developers no longer have to deal with these historical burdens.

Diverging Paths: Comparing the “Continuous Iteration” Philosophy of Solana

On how blockchain should evolve, industry leaders present different ideas.

While Buterin calls for Ethereum to introduce a “garbage collection” mechanism and pursue long-term stability and independence, Solana Labs CEO Anatoly Yakovenko expressed a different view. He believes that a blockchain must continuously iterate and evolve to meet new developer and user needs, even if that means no single group leading these changes.

These two philosophies reflect different expectations for the blockchain lifecycle. Buterin’s vision is for Ethereum to eventually pass the “exit test,” reaching a state where it can operate safely and predictably for decades without ongoing intervention from core developers. In contrast, Yakovenko emphasizes maintaining network competitiveness and relevance through ongoing, even potentially radical, updates.

Market Response and Long-term Narrative

This forward-looking philosophical discussion about technology, spanning ten or even a hundred years, interacts subtly with current market performance.

As of January 19, 2026, according to Gate market data, Ethereum (ETH) is priced at $3,213.25, down 2.97% in 24 hours. Despite the overall market pressure, ETH maintains a market cap of approximately $387.58 billion and an 11.80% market share, reflecting its continued core position among mainstream crypto assets.

From a mid- to long-term perspective, ongoing technical routes such as Layer1 architecture simplification and Verge phase upgrades mainly reflect systematic optimization of the protocol’s long-term security, scalability, and maintainability. These foundational evolutions typically do not directly translate into short-term price catalysts but continue to reinforce Ethereum’s underlying value as a “trustworthy digital infrastructure.”

At the market structure level, this emphasis on protocol robustness and long-term sustainability is gradually attracting more long-term institutional funds and core developers. Signals indicate that Ethereum’s technical focus is shifting from rapid feature stacking to building a more solid and durable underlying architecture, laying the groundwork for its long-term ecosystem expansion and capital allocation.

Slowing Down to Go Further

In this profound reflection on protocol complexity, Buterin has proposed a conclusion that may make ecosystem participants uncomfortable: Ethereum might need to reduce changes rather than increase them. He views Ethereum’s past fifteen years as an “experimental adolescence,” during which many ideas were tested—some succeeded, others failed.

The current danger is that those failed or outdated ideas could become permanent burdens for the protocol. Therefore, he hopes that, in the long run, Ethereum’s pace of change can slow down. The ultimate goal is to strip away useless parts from the protocol, preventing them from becoming permanent drag, and ensuring Ethereum as a decentralized superstructure can transcend the rise and fall of specific organizations or eras and operate sustainably.

As of January 19, 2026, Ethereum’s market cap remains large, and its trading activity is among the top. On the Gate exchange, ETH’s trading depth is sufficient, with stable bid-ask spreads, demonstrating market maturity and calmness when digesting such long-term technical issues. When Vitalik talks about “garbage collection,” he is discussing far more than code optimization. This may mark a turning point: the most active ecosystem in cryptocurrency is moving from a reckless youth to a cautious, responsible adulthood—learning to do subtraction sometimes requires more wisdom and courage than constantly adding.