Carlos

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<a href="https://blockworks.co/news/solana-prepares-for-alpenglow">Last week</a>, we dove deep into SIMD-326 (Alpenglow), which proposes a new consensus protocol for Solana. The headline impact of Alpenglow is a 100x reduction in Solana&#8217;s finality time, from ~12.8 seconds to around 150ms. 



A validator-signaling vote for SIMD-326 took place between epochs 840 (starting Aug. 27) and 842 (ending today), with a preliminary stake participation rate of 51% as of writing.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1600" height="900" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=1024&amp;h=1024" alt="" class="wp-image-106970" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=1600 1600w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=464 464w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-6.png?w=80 80w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px" /></figure>



SIMD-326 will pass, with ~99% of non-abstaining votes in favor. With Alpenglow&#8217;s voting period coming to a close, it&#8217;s a good time for a refresher on how Solana governance works.&nbsp;



Solana&#8217;s onchain governance is meant to signal community sentiment rather than automatic enforcement of changes. In other words, social consensus is the final arbiter, with the real decision point resting with validators and developers who must collectively agree to deploy and run the new software. A key stakeholder in this process is the Anza team, which must design and roll out changes in the Agave client via<a href="https://github.com/anza-xyz/agave/wiki/Feature-Gate-Tracker-Schedule"> feature gates</a>. &nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1600" height="900" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=1024&amp;h=1024" alt="" class="wp-image-106969" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=1600 1600w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=464 464w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/image-5.png?w=80 80w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px" /></figure>



With this context in mind, all Solana Improvement Documents (SIMDs) formally begin as written proposals on <a href="https://github.com/solana-foundation/solana-improvement-documents">Solana’s GitHub</a>. In this stage, the community and core contributors can openly discuss and adjust variables before a SIMD goes into a vote, implement it without requiring one, or outright reject it before that happens. Forum discussions play a crucial role in Solana governance by enabling structured, thoughtful debate on proposals​ and their potential effects.&nbsp;



Solana’s onchain governance model is akin to a representative democracy in the sense that validators vote on behalf of stakers, who are free to delegate their staked SOL to any validator. Each validator’s voting power is proportional to the stake delegated to them, and validators can even split their vote weight among distinct options if they choose (Yes, No, or Abstain). Typically, the voting period for any given SIMD lasts three epochs (around six days).



Finally, Solana requires two parameters for a SIMD vote to pass. The first is the quorum threshold: At least 33% of the total stake must participate (including abstains) for the vote to be valid. The second requirement is the supermajority: At least two-thirds of non-abstaining votes must be &#8220;Yes&#8221; for the proposal to pass. SIMD-326 received overwhelming support compared to more contentious proposals, such as SIMD-96 (which discontinued the burn on priority fees), SIMD-123 (which will implement an in-protocol way to distribute priority fees), and SIMD-228 (the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/what-simd-0228-failing-means-for-solana">infamous failed</a> inflation reduction proposal).



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Inside Solana’s governance as Alpenglow passes

The Solana community has approved SIMD-0326, known as the Alpenglow consensus protocol, in a governance vote concluding Tuesday.



<a href="https://simd-votes.stakingfacilities.com">According</a> to the official vote status page, 98.94% of participants voted in favor, 1.05% opposed, and 0.36% abstained. Overall, 52% of the network’s total stake participated, comfortably surpassing the quorum threshold.



The decision commits the network to its most significant technical overhaul to date, replacing proof-of-history and TowerBFT with a new architecture designed to reduce transaction finality from roughly 12.8 seconds to as little as 150 milliseconds.



Alpenglow introduces two key components: Votor, an off-chain signature aggregation system enabling sub-second block confirmation, and Rotor, a new block propagation mechanism replacing Turbine.



Together they simplify consensus logic, eliminate on-chain vote transactions, and reduce ledger bloat. A resilience model, known as 20+20, is designed to maintain safety if 20% of stake is adversarial and liveness if another 20% is offline.



Validator economics were a central discussion point during governance. The new design implements a fixed Validator Admission Ticket of 1.6 SOL per epoch, replacing vote transaction fees. Some forum participants warned that this creates a high entry barrier for new validators, while developers countered that alternative models could enable stake-splitting attacks.



Leaders will also receive enhanced rewards for aggregating votes and submitting finalization certificates, potentially reshaping staking economics. Developers acknowledged that additional rules may be needed to address bad behavior if it arises under the new system.



The vote passed with near-unanimous support, reflecting validator appetite for Solana to push the limits of performance. Still, the change raises open questions about validator diversity, centralization pressures, and resilience during <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/lightspeed-newsletter-solana-outage-patch">outages</a>.



This is a developing story.



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This article was generated with the assistance of AI and reviewed by editor&nbsp;<a href="mailto:jeffrey@blockworks.co" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Jeffrey Albus</a>&nbsp;before publication.



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Solana governance passes Alpenglow consensus upgrade

Donovan Choy

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



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Solana validators have begun voting on SIMD-0326, the governance proposal for its new <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/solana-alpenglow-next-gen-consensus-layer-speed">Alpenglow consensus protocol</a>.



The proposal needs at least 33% of validators to reach quorum. As of this morning, at least 11.8% (135) of Solana’s ~1.3K validators have voted in favor, based on <a href="https://dune.com/kagren0/simd-0326-voting-status">Dune</a>.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXe8qXRrteOvrnBbGBNTTt81f6yKynyWZAN1kemQ1T-A85QMfoXg0kKkFi75J-4J3xZq_e3qRx35Cy0ARfrnQdTBFeUvvdQbvN0AnQI_dwgW4XwJQ18BH1zZ1QBK2OArDrejNrui?key=g93vGr6mMwKrQnYKnL2EnQ" alt=""/></figure>



When you send a transaction on Solana today, the chain takes about ~12.8 seconds (32 slots * 0.4s slot time) to reach deterministic finality, though it is also sometimes informally referred to as having a soft/optimistic transaction finality of 500-600ms.&nbsp;&nbsp;



12.8 seconds is fast compared to the 12.8 minute finality of Ethereum’s Gasper consensus, but it pales in comparison to the consensus speed of newer chains like Sui’s Mysticeti, with 390-500ms.



Alpenglow <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/solana-prepares-for-alpenglow">promises to collapse</a> the 12.8-second time window further to 100-150ms, bringing about a 100x improvement, depending on where a validator is geographically located.



It does so by eliminating a few core legacy pieces of Solana’s chain like <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/solana-proof-of-history">proof-of-history</a> (PoH), Tower BFT and gossip-based vote propagation.



The average Solana user has no idea what these are, nor do they need to care, so I&#8217;ll try to keep it simple.&nbsp;



PoH and Tower BFT are the twin core pieces of Solana’s architecture today that allow validators to order blocks without having to interact.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Think of PoH as a pre-consensus cryptographic stopwatch that timestamps blocks. Those timestamps serve as a shared clock which the Tower BFT algorithm then serves up to validators for commitments. This way, the Solana blockchain is able to keep producing blocks without requiring a synchronous consensus round as is typical with traditional chains.



This protocol design has served Solana well, but there are trade-offs.



For one, it creates an overhead cost for voting transactions, which makes up something like 70% of Solana’s onchain transactions (see gray chart below). Vote transactions are distinctly separate from the kinds of transactions that ordinary users send to use the chain; they are an attestation that validators have to pay to lock in their commitments for Tower BFT, or a cost of doing business.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXdYseNq0kL6YtWTBAaXpsynKarYP0qNRKRVMx6BszJ81PZ7SztPeA91Lo-03As6z_rf6ZAkBp2qFGUXkP2sFgM6Hb0RCDdHoHOZyCq_58jiO0_MKGZmNj4hiPu0ZKoPVrIVjrP-Iw?key=g93vGr6mMwKrQnYKnL2EnQ" alt=""/></figure>



This has created something of a longstanding pernicious problem for Solana validators.



The bigger the stake of a Solana validator, the more earning opportunities they are given to produce blocks. But every validator, regardless of the size of their stake, pays the same fees to vote.



This “fixed cost, variable income” economics results in a situation where large validators end up with a greater stake over time, in effect centralizing network stake from smaller to large validators. Network decentralization suffers because it’s unprofitable to run a validator unless you’re coming in with deep pockets.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXd2dpfuDdqfXstqBVAXWT6TUF_jb5rudhGATKOGQGjrm3H4zsnkzfAmXG7o7xGuanieI09GUaaDp7ciIqvqEiQTIdECBbh0MyOdss4kF-y8997cBuVVAZaHwyT_ml_0ZIVzWj4w?key=g93vGr6mMwKrQnYKnL2EnQ" alt=""/></figure>



(That also explains why the Solana Foundation has an <a href="https://solana.org/delegation-criteria">initiative</a> to subsidize smaller validators in their first year of operations.)



Alpenglow aims to nip this problem in the bud by getting completely rid of voting costs. That’s where its new components, Votor and Rotor, come in.



Votor shifts validator voting off-chain, but records the aggregate as a compact onchain certificate. Alpenglow therefore replaces per-slot vote transactions with a fixed fee, compressing consensus into one-two rounds to achieve its target finality of 100-150ms.



Rotor, on the other hand, is an improved block propagation protocol that replaces Turbine. It uses a simpler relay scheme to reduce the number of times data jumps from node to node, shaving off end-to-end network latency.



Votor and Rotor jointly underpin Alpenglow’s promised “20+20” resilience model. Under this new model, the Solana network preserves safety and liveness even with 20% of stake controlled by malicious validators and an additional 20% offline.



If this is still all too confusing, just picture AI Peter Griffin dancing through a Minecraft map — somehow, consensus starts to make sense.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">solana alpenglow in less than 100 seconds (brainrot version) <a href="https://t.co/QPtHd5QQct">pic.twitter.com/QPtHd5QQct</a>&mdash; doppelbanger (brainrot lead) (@doppelbanger_gm) <a href="https://twitter.com/doppelbanger_gm/status/1958478061692707100?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 21, 2025</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



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Solana validators commence vote on landmark Alpenglow consensus protocol

Shaunda Devens

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Solana’s consensus stack, proof-of-history sequenced with TowerBFT, has always delivered faster block times than competitors. But finality still sits around <a href="https://www.helius.dev/blog/solana-commitment-levels">10-20 seconds</a>, far from the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/nasdaq-on-solana-opening-bell-sol-strategies">Nasdaq-level</a> latency Solana aspires to.



<a href="https://forum.solana.com/t/simd-0326-proposal-for-the-new-alpenglow-consensus-protocol/4236?utm_source=chatgpt.com">SIMD-0326 (“Alpenglow”)</a> proposes cutting finality to ~100-150ms by moving validator voting off-chain. Today, validators continuously post votes onchain to signal fork choice, and these votes dominate throughput despite carrying no user value.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXep-a2mLDrML2PqhV7_I3cZcXheUNUMCvLGzKzNsibs7NUiDFVpVXsJR5spqn8eQ4GI4iiaRDP7IDBz3JBNePOjlWx8B1i0dDBywoA5NIPArzpJp4X9RKow_rlOo7Fn5q8__6meyw?key=bDbckPlQ3bo3NOrYyaM8OA" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Source: <a href="https://solscan.io/analytics#txs">SolScan</a></figcaption></figure>



Under Alpenglow, validators instead pay a fixed “Admission Ticket” of 1.6 SOL per epoch, burned to the network. Leaders then gather votes off-chain through a component called Votor, compress them into certificates, and write those certificates onchain. The result is a swap: Millions of low-value vote transactions are replaced by one predictable fee per validator, lowering consensus overhead by ~20% and freeing blockspace for user activity.



The design also adjusts fault tolerance. TowerBFT today remains live unless more than 33% of stake is adversarial. Alpenglow introduces a “20+20” model, where the chain stays live with 20% malicious stake and another 20% offline. For applications like DeFi, specifically perpetual exchanges like Drift, sub-second finality transforms Solana from “fast” into a real-time settlement layer.



The economics are still under debate. Smaller validators face a flat 1.6 SOL per epoch fee regardless of stake, while reward flows remain undefined. Governance discussions (epochs 833-842) have emphasized the need for a clear rollout path, including sequencing for Alpenglow’s components. Still, if implemented, SIMD-0326 would represent one of Solana’s most significant structural upgrades.



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