July 18, 2026
Epoch644van Rossem
Intra-era upgrade delivering cleaner ledger rules, VRF key uniqueness, Plutus smart contract performance improvements and new cryptographic built-ins
Conway Era
What hard forks were implemented, and what functionalities did they introduce?
Hard forks in Cardano do not signify division and differences within the ecosystem. On the contrary, they define a specific and collectively agreed-upon exact time (slot) when all nodes switch to new protocol rules, sometimes starting a new era, applying new functions, validation rules, or parameter values. Stake pool operators install the new node version ahead of time. Since Plomin, the switch itself is approved on chain through a hard fork governance action. A Cardano hard fork is, therefore, not a separation but a precise collective evolution.
Every upgrade since Shelley went live through the hard fork combinator while the network kept running. How an upgrade is proposed, approved through governance and rolled out is explained in how Cardano works.
Intra-era upgrade delivering cleaner ledger rules, VRF key uniqueness, Plutus smart contract performance improvements and new cryptographic built-ins
Ended the bootstrap phase of CIP-1694. DReps vote on every type of governance action, and treasury withdrawals, constitution updates, no-confidence motions and changes to the Constitutional Committee became possible.
Introducing the first batch of decentralized governance features of CIP-1694. During this bootstrap phase only parameter changes, hard fork initiations and info actions were possible, and DReps voted on info actions only.
Introduced further improvements to Plutus smart contract functionality and overall network performance.
Improved the scalability and performance of the network, named after Vasil Dabov, a Cardano community member.
Intra-era upgrade that fixed a bug in how time is converted for Plutus scripts.
Introduced smart contract capabilities using Plutus, enabling the deployment of decentralized applications (DApps).
Brought native token functionality to Cardano, allowing users to create and transact with custom tokens.
Added token locking capabilities, which was a prerequisite for the smart contract functionality.
Introduced staking and decentralization features, transitioning from a federated to a decentralized system.
Switched consensus from Ouroboros Classic to Ouroboros BFT, the bridge to the Shelley hard fork.
The launch of the Cardano mainnet and introduction of the ada cryptocurrency.
Byron, the OBFT switch, Shelley, Alonzo and the Lobster upgrade are listed without a single transaction ID. Up to Chang, each ID is a protocol update proposal that triggered the hard fork. Plomin and van Rossem were approved as hard fork governance actions, and their IDs identify those actions.