Starknet tokenholders back study of leaving Ethereum for own Layer 1
Regulation & Gov ·
A governance vote cleared with more than 93.5% of voting power in favor of examining whether Starknet should become a standalone, quantum-resistant blockchain rather than remain an Ethereum scaling layer.
The ballot, reported by WuBlockchain, asked STRK holders only to greenlight preliminary research into the idea, not to approve an actual migration. StarkWare, the entity behind much of Starknet's development, intends to put out a draft whitepaper in November laying out how such a shift might work and what a post-quantum security design would look like.
Starknet currently operates as a Layer 2 network built on top of Ethereum, inheriting security and settlement from the base chain. The proposal under discussion would move it toward operating as an independent Layer 1, a structural change that would alter its relationship to Ethereum and require new infrastructure resistant to attacks from quantum computing, a long-term concern for cryptographic systems built on current encryption standards.
The result was corroborated separately by The Block, which likewise described the vote as community backing for exploring a post-quantum, independent Layer 1 rather than a final decision on the matter.
Both accounts stress that this vote carries no binding weight beyond funding or authorizing the research phase itself. Any actual transition would need to clear a separate, dedicated governance process before taking effect, meaning the current outcome signals direction of interest rather than a committed roadmap change.
What remains unresolved is the substance of that eventual proposal: how a quantum-resistant Layer 1 would be architected, what it would mean for Starknet's existing ties to Ethereum, and how the community will vote once concrete technical details arrive in the November draft whitepaper.