Ethlabs proposes 2027 Ethereum quantum target, pulls quick slots from Hegotá

What happened

Ethlabs, a nonprofit Ethereum research organization, has asked the network's core developers to bring quantum-resistant and "post-AI" protections forward to 2027, two years ahead of the timeline currently published by the Ethereum Foundation. The plan, named pqai27, was posted on the Ethereum Magicians forum on November 11 and was reported by Cointelegraph, Crypto.news and Blockonomi.

To redirect work toward that goal, Ethlabs said it will pull its Quick Slots proposal, Ethereum Improvement Proposal 8198, from the coming Hegotá upgrade. The feature would initially have cut block time from 12 seconds to 10. The group had backed it in August and says it still intends to pursue faster block production, now in 2028. "We don't take this decision lightly," it wrote in the proposal.

Other Hegotá items are also up for review. Ethlabs said FOCIL, a planned censorship-resistance feature, should be scheduled only if it does not put the quantum deadline at risk, while Frame Transactions, or EIP-8141, should remain a priority because it would let accounts use more flexible authentication, including signature methods designed to resist quantum attacks. Glamsterdam, the fork that precedes Hegotá, should go ahead as planned, the group said.

The proposal has not been approved. Ethereum core developers have yet to agree to the 2027 target, and the Ethereum Foundation's roadmap still lists December 2029 for quantum resistance across the execution, consensus and data layers.

Why it matters

The proposal ties a security deadline directly to upgrade scheduling. Under Ethlabs' approach, features that consume developer attention in Hegotá and later forks would be weighed against cryptographic work, and anything not on the critical path to quantum and post-AI readiness would be reconsidered. The group argues that committing now is cheaper than changing course once work on the planned fork is far advanced. It also separates initial protection from full performance: in the first stage, consensus would rely on quantum-resistant cryptography and users would have a way to secure their accounts, with the network potentially running at reduced capacity if existing protections became vulnerable. The second stage would restore full capacity for quantum-resistant transactions and data processing. Ethlabs described finishing that second stage during 2027 as the more ambitious of its targets.

What the data shows

The proposal names two technical dependencies for the full-capacity stage: EIP-8288, which addresses signature aggregation, and EIP-8479, which concerns quantum-resistant data availability. For consensus, Ethlabs set out two possible routes, either modifying the existing Gasper design or adopting a newer architecture known as decoupled consensus. It also proposed giving wallet providers and validator operators tools to migrate to quantum-resistant keys, including key rotation, separate recovery permissions and tighter control over account access. In making the case for speed, the group cited recent AI research that solved hundreds of open mathematics problems and identified roughly 1,000 vulnerabilities in Linux, along with its view that the security of cryptography is itself an open mathematical problem.

Background

Ethlabs was founded by former Ethereum Foundation researchers and launched earlier this year as a nonprofit focused on Ethereum research and development. The Foundation adopted its 2029 deadline while preparing for the possibility that quantum computers could threaten existing cryptography around 2030, and it plans to reassess those risks with outside experts in January 2027. At Devcon, Foundation researcher Justin Drake said he hoped to complete the transition in 2028. Ethlabs cited the wider policy context as part of its case, pointing to Google's aim of completing its own post-quantum transition by 2029 and to a shift in US government planning for quantum-related risk from 2035 to 2030.

What is still unclear

Ethlabs acknowledged that researchers cannot establish when AI might threaten existing cryptography, or whether certain mathematical attacks will ever become feasible. It argued that the difficulty of reasoning about those timelines is itself a reason to start early. Whether developers accept a reordering of upgrade priorities, and how FOCIL and other Hegotá work are ultimately scheduled, remains unresolved, as does the question of how quickly the second, full-capacity stage could follow initial readiness. The group said it still supports the faster block production it is now deferring and is prepared to defend that decision to supporters who expected it in Hegotá.

What to watch

The next signals will come from core developer discussions on Hegotá scheduling and from the Ethereum Foundation's planned risk reassessment with outside experts in January 2027. Also worth following is progress on the account-level changes in Frame Transactions and on the migration tools proposed for wallets and validator operators, since those determine whether users actually gain a post-quantum route for their accounts.

Questions readers ask