Firedancer Developers Advocate Removing Solana’s Compute Unit Limit

Firedancer proposes removing Solana's compute unit limit post-Alpenglow update.

The team behind the high-performance Solana client Firedancer has proposed lifting the cap on compute units (CU) in blocks following the Alpenglow update, which is expected to be tested this year.

SIMD-0370 suggests abolishing the current limit of 60 million CU. Previously, there was discussion about increasing it to 100 million compute units.

With the removal of a fixed limit, block size would be determined by the number of transactions a high-performance validator can include. Nodes with less powerful equipment would automatically refrain from voting on “overloaded” blocks using the skip-vote mechanism, which will be introduced in Alpenglow.

The proposal argues that removing the block limit amid sufficient demand for network resources will push validators to upgrade their equipment. This would allow them to include more transactions per block and earn additional revenue. Other participants would be compelled to follow suit to remain competitive.

“[Such incentivization] creates a flywheel effect: block producers continuously improve efficiency, increasing the average power of the validator set. In turn, this allows for safely expanding the block capabilities, and so on,” the documentation notes.

Roger Wattenhofer, head of research at Anza — a Solana developer and initiator of the Alpenglow upgrade, stated that he is “a strong proponent of the idea of completely removing the compute limit.”

However, he noted that such a move could lead to centralization and pose a threat to network stability if a super-powerful block producer emerges. Nonetheless, Wattenhofer expressed confidence that “these issues are solvable.”

Alpenglow received near-unanimous approval during the vote that began in late August. The extensive consensus system update will reduce block finalization time from 12.8 seconds to 150 milliseconds. The improvement package will also enhance network resilience and increase data processing efficiency.

A Major Bet on Solana

Earlier this month, Jump Crypto, in collaboration with Galaxy Digital and Multicoin Capital, founded the “treasury” company Forward Industries, focused on Solana. The three firms invested $1.65 billion in cash and stablecoin commitments into the project. Jump Crypto’s CIO, Surab Sharma, joined the board of directors of the new entity.

It was soon revealed that Forward Industries will sell $4 billion in shares to acquire “people’s cryptocurrency.”

Back in previous reports, MEXC Research’s chief analyst Sean Young forecasted SOL’s rise to $250 by the end of the year.