Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has published an updated version of his 2023 roadmap, elevating quantum safety and privacy to higher-priority positions while deprioritizing verifiable delay functions (VDFs) and several earlier Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) improvements.

The revised roadmap introduces native rollups, blob and gas futures, new state types, and post-quantum scaling mechanisms. Buterin is also exploring execution architectures beyond the EVM, with RISC-V, LeanISA, recursive STARKs, and AI-assisted formal verification emerging as prominent areas of focus. The roadmap functions as Buterin's personal technical vision for Ethereum's protocol evolution rather than a binding development schedule, though it regularly signals directions that influence client teams and the broader research community.

Roadmap Reshuffling and New Priorities

According to Buterin, several items in the previous roadmap have been reorganized. Quantum safety now commands greater attention, while VDFs and a number of EVM enhancements have been moved down the priority list. Other technical designs have evolved through newer approaches. The elevation of quantum safety reflects growing awareness across the cryptography community that sufficiently powerful quantum computers could eventually compromise the elliptic curve signatures currently securing Ethereum accounts.

Notably, Verkle trees have been replaced by unified binary trees and PBT (Post-Quantum Binary Trees), and state expiry has been superseded by new state types. Privacy has been elevated to first-class status within Ethereum's updated plans, with Buterin listing keyed nonces, recent roots, components of FOCIL, lean privacy pools, and wormholes among the relevant features.

The roadmap also incorporates post-quantum scaling through leanSPHINCS signatures and zkzk frames. Blob and gas futures have been added to Ethereum's planned infrastructure.

Native rollups have entered the roadmap following advances in SNARK (succinct non-interactive arguments of knowledge) technology. Buterin noted that the technology was not sufficiently mature for such an approach in 2023.

Exploring Execution Beyond the EVM

Buterin outlined a broader vision for Ethereum's execution layer, suggesting that zkzk frames could guide the protocol toward exposing an instruction set beyond the EVM. LeanISA and RISC-V are currently among the leading candidates. RISC-V is an open-standard instruction set architecture widely adopted in academic and industry hardware projects, and its consideration for Ethereum signals interest in an execution model with broad existing tooling and formal specification work.

He described both options as simpler, newer, and more efficient than the EVM. Buterin also raised the possibility of repositioning the EVM as an intermediate representation layered above another instruction set. However, he cautioned that deeper exploration remains premature for the current strawmap.

New state types also represent a distinct scaling approach, according to Buterin. These designs emphasize specialized mechanisms rather than attempting to maximize every category of Ethereum activity.

STARKs and AI-Assisted Verification

Buterin identified recursive STARKs and AI-assisted formal verification as recurring themes across the updated roadmap. Recursive STARKs appear across multiple Ethereum protocol layers, and a single verification primitive could potentially serve the execution, consensus, and data layers simultaneously.

He emphasized that formal verification becomes essential for the safe deployment of such shared components. Broader formal verification efforts are increasingly linked to modern AI tools, resulting in greater emphasis on mathematical code verification throughout the roadmap. The convergence reflects a wider trend in software engineering, where AI-driven tooling is being applied to prove correctness properties in complex systems that are difficult to validate through testing alone.

Buterin stated that Ethereum's long-term objectives include quantum safety, enhanced privacy, robust security, censorship resistance, and greater scalability. He also described a target architecture for Ethereum that remains lean and efficient over time.