World Chain plans to roll out streaming full EIP-7928 Block Access Lists inside every flashblock on mainnet on Aug. 17, becoming the first production Layer 2 blockchain to implement this feature, according to an announcement on Wednesday. The upgrade enables validators to verify blocks in parallel while they are still being built, targeting throughput of up to one gigagas per second without requiring more powerful hardware. EIP-7928 is an Ethereum Improvement Proposal proposed in March 2025 to add Block-Level Access Lists that serve as an enforced record of all accounts and storage slots accessed during a block's execution, with the update planned as a headliner for Ethereum's Glamsterdam hardfork in the second half of the year.
World Chain Streams Block Access Lists Every 200 Milliseconds
World Chain, the Optimism-based blockchain used by the World digital identity solution co-founded by OpenAI's Sam Altman, plans to stream block builder data incrementally every 200 milliseconds through its flashblock architecture, according to the announcement. Traditionally, validators must re-execute every transaction in a block sequentially before confirming its validity. Full block access lists instead provide a record of the blockchain state each transaction reads and writes, allowing independent transactions to be verified simultaneously across multiple CPU cores rather than one at a time. A gigagas is a performance metric representing the processing of one billion gas units.
Flashblocks Enable Near-Instant Transaction Preconfirmations
Flashblocks were developed by Flashbots as an extension of their Rollup Boost technology for OP Stack chains. The tech enables partial sub-blocks to be streamed about every 200 milliseconds within a standard 2-second block on OP Stack rollups, enabling near-instant transaction preconfirmations while the full block is still being assembled. Instead of waiting until an entire block has been produced, validators begin verifying transactions immediately as the block is assembled, reducing validation latency and spreading verification work throughout the block-building process, according to the announcement.
Test Network Benchmarks Show Stable Validation Latency
According to World's test network benchmarks, validation latency remained effectively stable even as blockchain throughput increased. The results suggest that blockchain networks can increase throughput substantially without proportionally increasing the computing resources required to independently verify the chain, according to the announcement. World is activating this feature via a runtime flag rather than a hard fork, as will happen on the base layer.
BNB Chain Previously Tested Block Access Lists via BEP-592
World is not the first EVM chain to test out BALs. BNB Chain, Binance's Ethereum sidechain, introduced BALs in BEP-592, delivering measurable improvements in CPU usage, throughput and block processing, a BNB devs X account said. Ethereum co-creator Joseph Lubin previously told The Block that technical upgrades are often tested out in its ecosystem of Layer 2s before introduction on the mainchain, often providing positive feedback from production-level environments.
FAQ
What is World Chain rolling out on Aug. 17?
World Chain is rolling out streaming full EIP-7928 Block Access Lists inside every flashblock on mainnet on Aug. 17, becoming the first production Layer 2 blockchain to implement this feature. The upgrade enables validators to verify blocks in parallel while they are still being built, targeting throughput of up to one gigagas per second without requiring more powerful hardware.
How do flashblocks work on World Chain?
Flashblocks stream block builder data incrementally every 200 milliseconds through World Chain's flashblock architecture. The tech enables partial sub-blocks to be streamed about every 200 milliseconds within a standard 2-second block on OP Stack rollups, enabling near-instant transaction preconfirmations while the full block is still being assembled. Flashblocks were developed by Flashbots as an extension of their Rollup Boost technology for OP Stack chains.
