Ethereum (ETH) Co-founder Vitalik Buterin Outlines Vision to Replace EVM with RISC-V Architecture

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has outlined a new vision for the blockchain platform in a May 3 blog post, proposing to replace the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) with RISC-V architecture.

In a May 3 blog post, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has unveiled a new vision for the blockchain platform, proposing to replace the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) with RISC-V architecture. This change would aim to boost performance while rendering the network simpler and more accessible.

Buterin's post envisions a future where Ethereum could "become close to as simple as Bitcoin" within a five-year timeframe. The comparison is no coincidence, as he went on to praise Bitcoin's protocol design.

"One of the best things about Bitcoin is how beautifully simple the protocol is," Buterin said. He explained that this simplicity brings key benefits that help make Bitcoin "a credibly neutral and globally trusted base layer."

The proposal focuses on adopting RISC-V, an open-source instruction set that dictates how software interacts with processors. For Ethereum, this would eliminate the need for extra translation steps currently required by the EVM.

With RISC-V, applications could operate directly on the execution layer. This adjustment could render some operations up to 100 times faster while still ensuring compatibility with existing smart contracts.

Buterin also highlighted the technical advantages of shifting to RISC-V. The current EVM is custom-built for Ethereum and requires translation to other formats, which slows down processes. In contrast, RISC-V can handle operations directly and is "simpler to reason about," according to Buterin.

This simplification could lead to more people understanding and being able to participate in protocol research. It could also reduce the cost of developing new infrastructure and lower long-term protocol maintenance costs.

Buterin further stated that the change would minimize the "risk of catastrophic bugs" and reduce the "social attack surface" by having fewer components in the system.

The plan sets its sights on three major areas of simplification: the Consensus Layer, the Execution Layer, and sharing components across protocol layers. For the Consensus Layer, Buterin suggests implementing a "three-slot finality" design to eliminate complex concepts.

As for the Execution Layer, he noted that "The EVM is increasingly growing in complexity, and much of that complexity has proven unnecessary."

Despite these ambitious goals, Buterin acknowledged past failures in improving Ethereum. The network has often not met simplicity goals "sometimes because of my own decisions," he said.

Not all analysts are convinced by the proposal. Dominick John, an analyst at Kronos Research, told Decrypt that Buterin's latest proposal could "break backward compatibility, demand massive developer retraining, and rely on immature tooling."

John also noted that Ethereum's governance "requires broad consensus across fragmented stakeholders, a massive coordination challenge."

Ethereum has faced difficulties in the market recently, with its share collapsing to an all-time low of 7% in April. The cryptocurrency has been trading around $1,800, remaining 63% below its 2021 all-time high.

In comparison, Bitcoin is only 13% down from its peak price earlier this year. However, some analysts remain optimistic about Ethereum's recovery potential.

Thad Pinakiewicz, researcher at Galaxy, offered a more positive perspective. "Price isn't the scoreboard for technological maturity," he wrote in a recent newsletter. "Ethereum isn't failing because the price is flat. It’s succeeding because it’s laying down infrastructure others are copying."

Buterin ultimately framed the simplification effort as a long-term investment. "Caring about simplicity is, like decentralization, a short-term cost for the sake of benefits that do not appear immediately."