Solana activates Alpenglow consensus upgrade on mainnet
Solana validators retired TowerBFT and switched the live network to the Alpenglow consensus protocol, cutting transaction finality from about 12.8 seconds to roughly 150 milliseconds, core engineering team Anza said, as reported by Decrypt. Anza CEO Brennan Watt called it the largest blockchain upgrade since Ethereum's Merge.
Only one publisher so far. Another independent outlet or an official source would raise it.
Project updates topic · core coin ETH
No time pressure
Three separate rule-based signals. None is the probability that the report is true. How they work →
Key facts
Attributed sources: Decrypt
ETH after this site detected it
- 5 minutes-0.24%vs BTC -0.14 pp
- 1 hour+0.98%vs BTC +0.51 pp
- 24 hours-3.04%vs BTC -0.18 pp
Claims and open questions
What sources claim
- Anza said Alpenglow went live on the main network, with validators retiring TowerBFT at slot 459,653,000 around 14:00 UTC, per Decrypt.
- Anza said finality time fell from about 12.8 seconds under TowerBFT to roughly 150 milliseconds under Alpenglow, Decrypt reported.
- According to Decrypt, validators approved the upgrade in September 2025 with 98% in favor of proposal SIMD-0236.
Still unresolved
- Does Anza or the Solana Foundation plan to publish post-launch metrics confirming the roughly 150-millisecond finality on mainnet?
- What timeline, if any, have Anza or Solana set for the planned Rotor and geographically aware leader rotation upgrades?
Model-assisted explanation; citations, numbers and output format are checked. This is not independent semantic verification.
Source evidence
decrypt.co
Published 21/10/2026, 14:24 · Received 21/10/2026, 14:27
Original source titles remain in their source language. Full articles are not republished.
Market reaction after detection
Returns start at the sample closest to site detection (within the same minute up to 10 minutes later), using the same data source and quote currency. Actual sample times are shown; missing observations remain blank.
| Window | Return | BTC | Difference from BTC (pp) | Actual sampled interval / source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minutes | -0.24% | -0.10% | -0.14 pp | 21/10/2026, 14:27 → 21/10/2026, 14:33 (UTC) Gate · USDT |
| 1 hour | +0.98% | +0.47% | +0.51 pp | 21/10/2026, 14:27 → 21/10/2026, 15:28 (UTC) Gate · USDT |
| 24 hours | -3.04% | -2.86% | -0.18 pp | 21/10/2026, 14:27 → 22/10/2026, 14:27 (UTC) Gate · USDT |
Historical market context
Research: hourly returns and BTC beta →
Closed hourly candles from the 30 days before this event observation. Different venues are kept separate.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Hourly coverage | 100.0% (720/720) |
| Median absolute 1h return | 0.19% |
| 99th percentile of absolute 1h returns | 1.46% |
| Historical hourly BTC beta | 1.17 (719 matched returns) |
OKX · USDT · Context as of 21/10/2026, 14:27 · Last included candle closed 21/10/2026, 14:00
Hourly descriptive statistics, not minute-move probabilities. Backfilled history never moves the observation cutoff above.
Event timeline
Source publication, receipt and analysis times are separate. All times UTC.
Source published: Decrypt
Source received: Decrypt
Event first detected by this site
Evidence record updated
English explanation generated
Latest content update
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