Etherean Foundation Releases Article: L1 and L2, From Division of Labor to Symbiosis

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Original Compilation: Chopper, Foresight News

The ultimate goal of the Ethereum Foundation’s Platform team is to drive the scaling of Ethereum as a unified, synergistic system, ensuring all users can use it with confidence. This article aims to share our perspective on the relationship between L1 and L2, explain the role of each layer, and how we (as an ecosystem) can leverage the strengths of both L1 and L2 to build the most compelling platform for all users. Some of this is already clear, while other aspects require validation through ongoing experimentation and iteration with the community and users.

TL؛ DR:

Goal: All individual and institutional users should have clear pathways to utilize, extend, and benefit from the core properties offered by Ethereum. The best way to achieve this is by fully leveraging the unique capabilities of each layer, strengthening Ethereum’s core attributes, and unlocking meaningful value for end-users through these attributes.

As the Ethereum ecosystem evolves, so does the role of each layer:

Past: The primary mission of L2s was to help Ethereum scale, with differentiation and customization being secondary. Scalability was the key focus.
Present: The primary mission of L2s is to provide differentiated functionality, services, customized solutions, go-to-market strategies, and zones of control, while also delivering scaling capacity. Currently, the biggest drivers are differentiation, control, and innovation.
L1 serves as the truly permissionless and maximally resilient global settlement, shared state, liquidity, and DeFi hub. A strong, scalable L1 that does not compromise on CROPS (Censorship Resistance, Openness, Privacy, Security) provides a better foundation for L2s.
L2s provide valuable new features, customization, and control to grow their own on-chain economies, while extending Ethereum’s core properties to more users. Strong L2s reinforce the Ethereum ecosystem and its center of gravity.

L2s encompass all aspects, establishing differentiated binding relationships with L1 based on their own needs:

L2s seeking the tightest integration with L1 should strive for synchronous composability, full interoperability, shared liquidity, and mechanisms like native rollups.
L2s with various business models or technical expertise will continue to play vital roles in the ecosystem, each offering unique capabilities that L1 cannot cover.

The Ethereum Foundation (EF) will continue to develop underlying technologies to help L2s seamlessly extend L1’s native properties, securely enabling cross-layer and cross-chain liquidity and asset interoperability; while also requiring L2s to be transparent, clearly disclosing their own security properties and verification standards. In short, both sides play important roles, and their actions must match their words.

تعارف

Over the past five years, a vast L2 ecosystem has emerged around Ethereum L1. Various L2s inherit different native properties from Ethereum: some fully replicate the decentralized architecture (e.g., Stage 2 Rollups), some inherit partial security properties (e.g., Validium, Prividium), and some are only compatible with the general EVM standard (not L2s). Many chains are still under development, often starting as independent chains and gradually integrating deeply into the Ethereum L1 ecosystem.

It is time for the Ethereum Foundation (EF) and the broader Ethereum ecosystem to update our understanding of the relationship between L1 and L2 networks. The last major update was arguably five years ago when the rollup-centric roadmap was first proposed as a path to scaling Ethereum.

Since then, much has changed. The technology enabling L2s to share Ethereum’s security and liquidity and interoperate with it has matured; the differentiated competitiveness and user value of L2s have become increasingly prominent; L2s themselves have grown, nurturing independent community ecosystems; and the L1 scaling roadmap has also evolved, becoming clearer. The Ethereum ecosystem needs to acknowledge these changes and learn from past successes and failures.

Over the past few months, the future direction of the relationship between Ethereum L1 and L2 has gradually clarified:

A thriving Ethereum ecosystem must be built on a strong L1 foundation.
Ethereum L1 will achieve orders-of-magnitude scaling while maintaining the highest levels of security and decentralization, continuing to serve as the core of the on-chain economy and the center of DeFi.
The future will feature an ecosystem of independent yet interoperable L2 chains that offer higher degrees of customization, control, and functionality that the L1 chain cannot provide. These L2 chains choose to root themselves within the Ethereum ecosystem because it is the best choice for their users, communities, or businesses.
L2 chains will both compete and collaborate to offer a wide variety of specialized block space, services, and assets.

This article aims to explain this symbiotic vision of L1 and L2 in more detail and chart a path for a mutually reinforcing relationship between Ethereum L1 and any chain that wants to root itself and become part of the ecosystem.

What roles do L1 and L2 play, and how do they work together?

Ethereum L1 is the world’s premier programmable blockchain, currently unmatched in user adoption, developer ecosystem, decentralization, resilience, and underlying robustness. Ethereum L1 is the heart of the DeFi ecosystem, concentrating the deepest liquidity across the network.

Ethereum L1 now has a clear path to scaling while preserving decentralization and security. Thanks to the collective efforts of numerous teams in the Ethereum ecosystem, zero-knowledge (ZK) technology has progressed far faster than anticipated. In the coming years, we will be able to increase Ethereum L1’s capacity by orders of magnitude while staying true to its core value vision.

At the same time, no single public chain can meet the diverse needs of the global on-chain economy. Even if Ethereum remains the leader and scales by 1000x in the future, there will still be many different chains because they offer specialization and customization that even L1 cannot provide:

Specialization for specific applications or use cases
Non-EVM functionality
Additional privacy guarantees
Pricing mechanisms or transaction inclusion logic
Ultra-low latency or other sequencing characteristics
Extreme scaling properties that L1 cannot match
Specialized economies, market entry strategies, and growth approaches
Modular design to meet compliance or other business needs
Other improvements or innovations that can iterate and deliver faster than L1
…

This presents an opportunity for L1 and L2 to establish a mutually beneficial relationship, with each focusing on complementary roles.

Why would other independent public chains want to become Ethereum L2s?

Low Cost. Compared to building an independent base-layer chain, L2s can replicate Ethereum’s top-tier security and decentralization at an extremely low threshold; building a global decentralized validator set is costly, time-consuming, and extremely difficult. L2s can offload this responsibility to Ethereum L1, paying as needed without bearing high fixed setup costs.
Users and Developers. Interoperability with the largest L1 and L2 cluster provides access to more users and developers; interoperability and cross-chain user experience will accelerate due to the maturation of zero-knowledge proof technology, real-time proofs, faster L1 finality and L2 settlement, and bridging infrastructure.
Interoperability. If designed properly, L2s can securely access L1 assets and DeFi liquidity, user accounts on L1, and any services on L1, such as oracles, ENS.
بازارing: Being part of the Ethereum ecosystem offers brand and reputational advantages, as Ethereum has the best reputation, security track record, and regulatory recognition among all L1s.

What does Ethereum L1 gain from this? Based on our experience and discussions with various stakeholders in the ecosystem, we believe positioning Ethereum L1 at the heart of a growing network of L2s can strengthen Ethereum and ETH’s unique position in the on-chain economy:

Creating demand for ETH and providing trust-minimized, secure bridging services between ETH and other assets. ETH serves as both a store of value and currency within the Ethereum network.
Extending Ethereum’s network effects (e.g., EVM, developer education, developer tools, user onboarding, and interoperability among L2s)
Solidifying Ethereum’s crucial role as the core of a multi-chain ecosystem and the primary settlement and liquidity layer for the on-chain economy
Providing Ethereum with broader business development, growth, and marketing support.
L2s help realize the core vision of the Ethereum ecosystem. They act as distributed engines for Ethereum’s core properties (security, resilience, stability), maximizing the number of users who derive sustainable value from Ethereum.

The Ethereum ecosystem should not take these advantages for granted. Some remain points of contention within the community, or are long-term theories requiring experimentation, measurement, and analysis. Ultimately, the relationship between L1 and L2 must be mutually beneficial to succeed. Over the past five years, this relationship has achieved much and laid a crucial foundation for the future.

What does this mean for the future development of L2s?

What does this new vision mean for L2 users, their teams, and their communities?

Here are our recommendations:

L2s should focus on strategies that complement L1 and achieve platform differentiation. Many L2s are already successfully moving towards this vision. They achieve this through innovative features, targeting specific use cases (e.g., app-chains), offering new distribution methods, or adopting novel marketing strategies. This helps them create their own unique communities and extend Ethereum’s properties to millions of new users.
L2s should have the freedom to differentiate in various ways according to their vision. We have already seen differentiation in scalability, trustlessness, privacy, enterprise compliance, industry verticals, communities, and a range of technical innovations.
L2s can choose to extend all or part of Ethereum’s properties based on their goals. However, they should ensure users can easily understand the security properties they do and do not provide. L2s committed to minimizing trust should at least achieve Stage 1 and pass the “exit” test, meaning users can safely exit to L1 even in the presence of malicious operators or a failing security council. L2s aiming to be closest to L1 and fully inherit its properties should move towards: 1) achieving Stage 2; 2) synchronous composability; 3) becoming native rollups.
L2s should continue to work on broader interoperability and shared liquidity mechanisms, thereby strengthening the entire Ethereum ecosystem.
L2s should continue to operate transparently, clearly communicating their respective security properties and relationship to the L1 security layer to the ecosystem.

What is the Ethereum Foundation doing to help build such a world?

To realize this vision for the L1L2 relationship, the Ethereum Foundation is fully committed to advancing the following work:

We are committed to scaling the L1 layer and blobs without sacrificing decentralization. Current blob fill rates are only around 30%, leaving significant room for scaling. We can confidently scale blobs further if needed.
Specifically supporting L2s that have or wish to deepen expertise in areas like privacy, security, and trustlessness.
The Platform team, led by Josh Rudolf, aims to improve the overall performance of the Ethereum platform and serve as an interface between L2s and the core protocol roadmap.
Improving L1 liquidity to make it easier for L2s to access liquidity (faster finality, withdrawals, and deposits).
Working closely with L2 teams to understand their needs and reflect them in protocol priorities, while clarifying the relationship between L1 and L2. For this relationship to work effectively, we need to understand what works, what needs improvement, and collaborate. Our goal is always to clarify and strengthen the value proposition of being part of the Ethereum ecosystem.
Investing in R&D to enable “native rollup” technology—L2 chains that can be fully and trustlessly verified by L1, enabling synchronous composability and secure interoperability.
We are working closely with L2Beat and other entities to jointly monitor and verify the security properties of L2s. We must rigorously and honestly assess L2 characteristics and their degree of connection to L1 security so users and developers can make informed choices.
Addressing a major drawback of multi-chain ecosystems: fragmentation. We will collaborate with the ecosystem (including various chains, wallets, and infrastructure providers) to build better interoperability solutions addressing user experience and developer platform fragmentation. Now, with a clearer understanding of the L1-L2 relationship, we can begin to address the fragmentation of the Ethereum narrative.

Together, we will build a global, permissionless on-chain economic system and the best platform for all users.

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