The Coinbase Ethereum layer-2 network Base experienced a significant surge in daily transactions, reaching a record high of 2 million on March 16, shortly after the Dencun upgrade. Prior to the upgrade, Base was processing approximately 440,000 transactions per day. However, the day after the upgrade, this number skyrocketed to 1.1 million and continued to rise in the subsequent days, eventually peaking at 2,064,920 on March 16.
Additionally, the number of daily new users on Base also saw a massive increase, reaching 666,866 on March 16, which represents a staggering 3,200% rise compared to the average leading up to the Dencun upgrade.
This surge in transactions has been attributed to a significant reduction in fees on Base following the upgrade. According to Blockscout, average transaction fees on Base have decreased by over 60% since the upgrade.
Base, which was launched by Coinbase in August, is currently the sixth-largest network in the Ethereum layer-2 ecosystem, with a total value locked of $1.46 billion, and it holds a 4.1% market share of layer 2s, according to industry tracker L2beat.
The Dencun upgrade, which introduced Ethereum Improvement Proposal 4844, played a crucial role in reducing layer-2 transaction fees. This was achieved through the implementation of data blobs or proto-danksharding, which enhanced L2 data availability and resulted in gas cost reductions of up to 90% for some networks.
Following the upgrade, average transaction fees on prominent layer-2 networks such as Arbitrum, Optimism, Base, and zkSync Era have dropped by 60% to 90%, as reported by Dune Analytics.
Despite the success of Base, Arbitrum and Optimism continue to dominate the layer-2 ecosystem, with a combined total value locked of $23 billion, giving them a market share of 42% and 23% respectively.
In terms of gas fees, the Dencun upgrade led to a significant decrease in fees for token swaps on Uniswap’s Optimism deployment, with fees dropping as low as $0.01, according to Hayden Adams, the protocol founder. However, gas fees on Ethereum layer-1 have been high recently due to Ether’s price surpassing $4,000. Currently, an ETH transfer costs around $2.1, a USDC transfer approximately $5, and a Uniswap swap is around $16, according to Gasfees.io.