The discussion around Ethereum’s long-term direction has changed notably in recent years. The idea of a “rollup-centric roadmap,” once considered an ambitious projection, has become a practical description of how the network operates today. The Dencun upgrade marked an early transition point, and the recent Fusaka implementation has reinforced that shift by improving data efficiency and reducing the hardware requirements associated with Verkle Tree adoption. Together, these updates have pushed most day-to-day activity away from the base layer and toward Layer-2 networks.
Ethereum Mainnet continues to function as a secure settlement environment, but its role as a user-facing platform has diminished. High-value transactions, protocol operations and institutional-level activity remain on L1, while most retail interactions have moved to rollups such as Arbitrum, Base and Optimism. This migration reflects a broader structural change: even as discussions around the Ethereum price persist, the network prioritizes security and decentralization at the base layer while relying on L2 networks to deliver scalability and a more accessible user experience.
The Growing Importance of Layer-2 Networks After Fusaka
This interdependence has become a defining feature of the ecosystem. Without the L2 infrastructure, Ethereum would struggle to compete with high-throughput monolithic alternatives. At the same time, L2 networks rely on Ethereum for settlement assurances and censorship resistance. Fusaka’s improvements to data handling strengthen this connection by making rollup operations more efficient and predictable.
Still, the modular approach presents challenges. The shift to L2 adoption has introduced fragmentation, as liquidity, applications and users spread across multiple networks. Even with emerging interoperability frameworks and shared standards, moving assets or interacting across rollups can remain complex. Developers and infrastructure providers are working to reduce this friction, aiming to make cross-chain interactions smoother and more consistent.
What is clear is that Ethereum’s evolution depends heavily on the continued growth and maturity of its rollup ecosystem. The base layer provides the security guarantees, while L2s offer the execution environments where most applications can scale effectively. The success of this model will ultimately depend on whether these networks can streamline the user experience and make the underlying architecture increasingly seamless.
Ethereum’s rollup-centric future is no longer a theoretical destination. It is the operational structure defining the ecosystem today, shaped by recent upgrades and ongoing efforts to balance scalability, decentralization and usability across multiple layers.
