Vitalik has been an inspirational teacher. He supervises 1 batch of 20 students from Class 7 every year since July 2015. In the 7 years, he has been teaching, students have not just passed with flying colors but have become successful in what they do.
For 2 years (2020), this record has witnessed a few problems. Vitalik was told to teach not one but 3 classes. He loved the idea. The management thought he could accept the workload and brighten the future of all the children.
Even though everyone has passed in these 2 years, the result has not been exceptional like in the last 5 years. The parents began complaining, and the management got worried as well. They raise this concern with Vitalik.
The management understands how burdened Vitalik is with so many responsibilities. They suggest Vitalik split his duties with 2 teachers to give equal time to all students. Vitalik gives it a thought and goes ahead with this suggestion.
In 2022, this crucial change might bring back the same results parents have dreamed of.
In the cryptocurrency world, this is what Sharding can do to Ethereum. Before discussing Sharding, let us understand Ethereum.
What is an Ethereum?
Ethereum is a decentralized blockchain platform. Yes, it is not just a cryptocurrency coin, like everyone said. It is more than that. No matter which blog or website you read, if there is a suggested cryptocurrency to invest in, Ethereum will be on that list. The price for Ethereum today stands at 195000 INR or 2534 USD.
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Ethereum problems and scheduled updates:
Ethereum near-term price prediction is confusing. Why so? This is because of multiple problems the cryptocurrency market has witnessed. While a few months ago, the price prediction for an Ethereum spanned between 460000 INR (6000 USD) to 770000 (10000 USD), it now stands at 140000 INR (1800 USD) to 300000 INR (4000 USD).
Reasons for this price correction in Ethereum are:
1. The downfall in the stock market
2. War tensions between Russia-Ukraine
3. Inflation worries, and
4. Huge gas fees for the Ethereum network.
More than a million transactions take place on the network. But the gas fees are pretty high for these transactions. Here is a comparison of transactions to other popular networks:
| Cryptocurrency | Transaction speed |
| Ethereum | 13-15 |
| Solana | 50000-65000 |
| Polygon | Up to 65000 |
The gas fees on these platforms are way lower than the Ethereum network. Then why should anyone use this network?
Imagine the price Ethereum will pay when customers flock to other networks. To counter these problems, Ethereum has scheduled updates to lower gas fees.
They finally have kept an update that can boost Ethereum transactions on the network with low gas fees. That update is “Sharding.”
What is Sharding?
For Bitcoin and Ethereum, you can track transaction history right from the first transaction in 2009 and 2015, respectively. Each transaction is connected to 1 node. Now imagine millions of stored transactions in this one node. It’s become too heavy and hence is slowing down.
Sharding breaks down this single node into multiple nodes. Hence, each node will be an independent node. When someone ran a transaction earlier, it had to bear the entire network’s transactional load. After sharding, transactions can run faster without carrying the transactional capacity of the whole network. This will eventually reduce gas fees.
Ethereum sharding explained:
So how does Ethereum sharding work? After sharding is complete, all the nodes will be independent and remain connected to the primary network. You can share the information stored in 1 node with other nodes.
Ethereum sharding progress:
Currently, the Ethereum sharding will take place in the 2nd quarter of 2022. The updates will continue rolling out until 2023.