Cardano's Vasil Hard Fork Goes Live; What's Next?

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Fri, 09/23/2022 - 08:44
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Cardano's much-hyped Vasil hard fork has finally gone live after months of delays.

Input Output and Cardano Foundation successfully forked the mainnet via a hard fork combinator (HFC) event at 9:44 p.m. UTC.

While the new upgrade brings significant improvements to the proof-of-stake blockchain, it is worth noting that not all of them will be activated at once. As explained by Input Output CEO Charles Hoskinson, some of the features that come with the hard fork will be activated on Sept. 27, which will be the start of a new epoch.

The upgrade was originally supposed to go live in June, but the developers had to postpone it due to technical difficulties.

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The successful implementation of the Vasil hard fork has pushed the price of the native ADA token slightly higher. The cryptocurrency is up roughly 5.2% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinMarketCap. The cryptocurrency, however, is still down 84.89% from its record peak that was achieved on the verge of the Alonzo hard fork last September.

Cardano's most ambitious upgrade to date comes shortly after rival blockchain Ethereum finally switched to proof-of-stake, significantly reducing its CO2 footprint.

The upgrade makes smart contracts more efficient and cost-effective because of Plutus 2.0, a new version of the blockchain's scripting language. According to Hoskinson, plenty of new projects are now "excited" to deploy their smart contracts following the Vasil upgrade.