BNB Chain sets Mar 20 for Pascal hardfork on mainnet

The Mainnet Launch

Virtual machine compatibility via the enhancement proposal EIP-7702, which allows external accounts to execute smart contract code. This means that wallets can act as smart contracts that allow gas-free transactions, batch approvals, and swaps.

Pascal has introduced EVM compatibility with the same features that Ethereum is considering in the Pectra update. With its upgrade, the Binance blockchain network aims to improve the user experience and make it easier to connect to Web3 as decentralized applications finance gas fees.

Ahead of the Pascal hard fork, node operators and validators, exchanges and infrastructure providers, and developers need to upgrade. This is necessary to ensure compatibility, as not updating can lead to participants being out of sync after the mainnet update.

Next Steps for BNB Chain 

After the Pascal upgrade include two major achievements in network speed. These are being implemented via the Lorentz hard fork, which is expected to happen in April 2025, and via the Maxwell hard fork, which is scheduled to happen in June 2025.

Lorentz is targeting faster blocks of 1.5 seconds, while the Maxwell upgrade will result in BNB Chain transactions completing in less than a second – 0.75 seconds.

These are important updates as BNB Chain aims to advance in decentralized finance and artificial intelligence, as revealed by its recently unveiled AI roadmap.

In particular, the intersection of DeFi and AI has given rise to the rapidly expanding DeFAI ecosystem, which is bringing the capabilities of AI and blockchain to the fore. This includes the benefits of yield generation optimization, cross-chain analytics, and liquidity management.