Deconstructing Vitalik's strategic ambition to reconstruct the Ethereum execution layer with RISC-V

A friend asked me how I view @VitalikButerin's radical proposal to replace the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) bytecode with an open-source RISC-V instruction set architecture? Essentially, Ethereum is brewing a deep technological transformation led by ZK technology. Let me sort out the strategic logic behind it:

1. First of all, Vitalik's idea of replacing EVM with RISC-V is not new. As early as when he proposed the Rollup-Centric scaling strategy, he had already hinted at a similar idea: let the eligible layer2 become the execution layer of the mainnet, and the EVM was downgraded from the protocol layer to the "in-line" rollup execution client functional layer, becoming one of the many AltVMs.

The key to achieving this transformation lies in RISC-V as a lower-level, more general instruction set architecture, which can provide a unified "hardware" foundation for zkVM, enabling various execution environments to operate efficiently within the same framework. This architectural change must be built on the foundation of Ethereum completing the underlying SNARKs deployment, because only when ZK technology can be widely applied to state validation can this modular execution layer architecture achieve efficiency improvements while ensuring security.

2. To be honest, Ethereum's strategic adjustment at first glance seems to have the courage of "burning the boats and remaking itself", but a deeper analysis reveals that the substitutability of the execution layer is actually an inevitable path for established strong consensus public chains like Ethereum. In the face of the technological impact from emerging public chains like Solana and Sui, which boast extreme TPS, as well as the market diversion caused by numerous EVM-compatible chains, Ethereum chooses to take the initiative rather than passively endure the blows.

Because, purely from a technical indicator comparison, Ethereum's TPS indeed struggles to compete with new public chains like Solana and Sui, but in the trilemma, Ethereum has always adhered to the two core values of security and decentralization, while maintaining an unmatched ecological prosperity and developer community.

If Ethereum attempts to enhance the execution layer efficiency using the RISC-V open source instruction set architecture, especially in terms of ZK proofs, it is expected to bring a performance leap of 50-100 times. This strategy of iterating the execution layer without sacrificing the foundation retains Ethereum's core advantages while directly addressing its main shortcomings. Why not?

3. However, while celebrating the excitement for the new proposal, it is important to understand that the transition of the EVM to RISC-V is by no means a straightforward project. From the perspective of technical implementation, this transformation is likely to only be fully advanced after the large-scale deployment of ZK-SNARKs technology.

Compared to the major upgrades in the core layer of Ethereum over the past few years (such as the upgrade of the consensus layer from PoW to PoS), ideally, the entire process requires rigorous design, extensive testing, and strong community support, and it is estimated to take at least 2-3 years.

However, Vitalik emphasized backward compatibility in the proposal, suggesting that existing EVM contracts may continue to exist through RISC-V interpreters or parallel support mechanisms, which is crucial for alleviating the transition costs for developers and users. This gradual change strategy is also a robust strategic iterative style that Ethereum must possess as a secure decentralized layer-1 blockchain.

In my opinion, Vitalik's proposal to replace EVM with RISC-V is not just a simple adjustment of the technical architecture, but rather a proactive innovation strategy for Ethereum in response to the competition from high-performance public chains. This proposal is closely related to upgrades such as Verge and Purge in the Ethereum roadmap, and is essentially centered around the underlying SNARKs, aiming to establish a more efficient and flexible execution environment to support a diverse range of application scenarios in the future.

Previously, @drakefjustin revealed that the Ethereum Foundation will invest tens of millions of dollars in the zkVMs project. There is no doubt that zkVM is indeed one of the core narratives of Ethereum's future. Ethereum is attempting to build not just a more efficient execution layer but a modular architecture that can be compatible with multiple Virtual Machines. The discussion of RISC-V replacing EVM may just be the beginning.