State of Upgrade is EtherWorld’s ongoing series tracking Ethereum’s major network upgrades through proposal discussions, implementation progress, testing milestones, client readiness, and ecosystem impact. In this first Hegota edition, we look at the early proposals shaping Ethereum’s next upgrade after Glamsterdam.

As Ethereum developers continue advancing Glamsterdam toward deployment, attention is gradually turning to the network’s next major upgrade: Hegota. While still in the proposal selection phase, recent discussions across All Core Developers Consensus calls have started to reveal the themes likely to define Ethereum’s late-2026 roadmap.

Unlike Glamsterdam, which is already moving through active devnet testing and client coordination, Hegota remains focused on research, specification development, and early proposal evaluation. Current discussions suggest the upgrade could prioritize censorship resistance, validator experience, network efficiency, and consensus-layer improvements.

The early direction of Hegota also builds on ongoing Ethereum roadmap debates around proposer-builder separation, transaction inclusion guarantees, and validator operations. These themes have appeared across recent protocol discussions, including EtherWorld’s coverage of ACDC call updates and Ethereum’s broader upgrade planning.

• FOCIL Emerges as the Leading Candidate
• Key Hegota EIPs Under Evaluation
• Implementation Status and Client Readiness
• Research, Testing, and Ecosystem Implications

FOCIL Emerges as the Leading Candidate

The most prominent proposal currently associated with Hegota is Fork Choice Enforced Inclusion Lists, commonly known as FOCIL.

FOCIL aims to strengthen Ethereum’s censorship resistance by ensuring valid transactions cannot be indefinitely excluded from blocks. Instead of relying only on block builders to decide transaction inclusion, the proposal introduces inclusion guarantees enforced through Ethereum’s fork-choice mechanism.

This matters because Ethereum’s block production pipeline has become more complex after the rise of proposer-builder separation. While PBS improves specialization and efficiency, it also raises concerns around transaction censorship and builder centralization. FOCIL attempts to address this by giving the protocol stronger tools to preserve credible neutrality.

As discussed in EtherWorld’s earlier article, Hegota Should Complete the Holy Trinity of Censorship Resistance, Hegota could become an important upgrade for Ethereum’s long-term neutrality if FOCIL moves into the final scope.

If adopted, FOCIL may become one of Ethereum’s most significant censorship-resistance upgrades since the Merge.

Key Hegota EIPs Under Evaluation