MegaETH vs Monad: Ethereum technology showdown

In this episode we explore each other’s technological innovations, architectural designs, and community culture.

Translation: Biteye core contributor Viee

Editor: Crush, Biteye Core Employee

Community: @BiteyeCN

*Full text is approximately 2,500 words and estimated reading time is 5 minutes

Amid the rapid development of blockchain technology are Monad and MegaETH, two emerging projects that are driving the evolution of the Ethereum ecosystem in their own unique ways.

Recently, Keone Hon, founder of Monad, and Lei Yang, co-founder of MegaETH, had an in-depth conversation about their technological innovations, architectural design, and community culture.

Monad is a Layer 1 blockchain that aims to break performance bottlenecks through innovative execution and consensus mechanisms, achieving the ability to process over 10,000 transactions per second. Its design emphasizes efficiency and compatibility, allowing developers to seamlessly migrate existing Ethereum applications.

Mega ETH is a Layer 2 solution that aims to further improve Ethereum’s transaction performance, aiming to reach over 100,000 transactions per second. The project aims to provide users with a faster transaction experience by optimizing the existing Ethereum architecture.

This article summarizes the hour-long podcast interview, focusing on two blockchain projects with different architectures: Monad and MegaETH. It also discusses how these projects advance the speed and efficiency of the Ethereum ecosystem via different technical paths.

0 1

Monad: Reshaping the Future of Ethereum

Keone Hon introduced the core concept of Monad during the talk, emphasizing that it is a new version of Ethereum that aims to achieve a throughput of up to 10,000 transactions per second.

Monad optimizes the storage efficiency of Ethereum Merkle tree data by building a new database, Monad DB. Keone pointed out that the traditional Ethereum execution method is single-threaded, while Monad significantly improves the execution performance by introducing optimistic parallel execution and asynchronous execution.

According to Keone, the biggest bottleneck in the execution process is state access. Every smart contract depends on a residual state associated with the contract, which requires reading data from disk. Therefore, the biggest bottleneck of execution is actually state access, not just improving computational power.

Monad DB is designed to address this challenge and enable the database to be read efficiently and in parallel, freeing up more performance potential.

0 2

MegaETH: A Blockchain That Pursues Extreme Performance

Unlike Monad, Lei Yang stated that MegaETH’s goal is to build a blockchain that is optimized for performance and fully compatible with Ethereum. Its vision is to be “the first real-time blockchain.”

MegaETH, as Ethereum’s Layer 2, aims to achieve a transaction processing capacity of over 100,000 times per second. Lei emphasized that MegaETH does not rely solely on parallelization, but focuses on improving single-threaded performance. He believes that single-threaded performance is crucial for the practical use of many applications.

In terms of technical implementation, MegaETH uses a single active sorter to process all transactions, while other nodes only need to subscribe to status updates.

This design not only reduces execution redundancy, but also reduces the hardware requirements for full nodes. Lei further explained that MegaETH has developed a new data structure similar to the Merkle Patricia tree, which optimizes hardware utilization to support efficient transaction processing.

0 3

Decentralization debate from different perspectives

In the discussion of decentralization, Keone and Lei have different points of interest. Keone believes that Monad’s architecture provides decentralization, trust neutrality, and censorship resistance through independent single nodes and complete nodes. He emphasized that decentralization is not just a technical choice, but also a core value of the community.

Lei believes that MegaETH is superior in terms of decentralization because it relies on tens of thousands of Ethereum nodes to ensure finality and correctness. He pointed out that MegaETH’s single sequencer can achieve extremely low transaction feedback time, which is impossible in any consensus-based system.

Although the two founders disagree on the definition of decentralization, they both agree that this feature is crucial for the long-term development of blockchain. All Layer 2 solutions can claim to be more decentralized because they rely directly on Ethereum for settlement. Monad improves the efficiency of Ethereum by incorporating new technologies without increasing hardware requirements. This improvement improves the performance of Ethereum and supports the optimization of the entire decentralized system.

0 4

Thinking about technical differences between hardware and software

Keone and Lei also have different views on technology philosophy. Keone emphasized that Monad focuses on getting maximum performance out of the smallest hardware, allowing anyone to run a node with common equipment. He believes this requires software optimization rather than relying on high-end hardware. Monad’s goal is to ensure decentralization while improving Ethereum’s performance.

Lei said that MegaETH chose the Layer 2 architecture because it is the best performance solution and can eliminate the redundancy of execution and consensus to the maximum. They will not follow the old ways, but will be performance-oriented without hesitation. Lei specifically mentioned that MegaETH’s design makes the feedback time of transactions as low as 1 millisecond, which is unprecedented in any consensus-based system.

0 5

Community culture and brand image

In terms of community building, the two founders also have different focuses. Keone pointed out that Monad encourages everyone to play a role and create a positive environment. He emphasized that Monad’s mascot and activities are spontaneously created and promoted by community members, reflecting the spirit of decentralization.

Relatively speaking, Lei introduced the brand image of MegaETH “Mega Mafia” to attract developers who are interested in high-performance blockchain applications. They are especially interested in founders who are disappointed with the existing infrastructure and hope to realize their dreams through MegaETH.

06

When will the main network launch?

Keone said the Monad team is working hard and could not yet give an exact date.

Lei responded that MegaETH is expected to open late this year or early next year.

07

To summarize

Both Monad and MegaETH aim to create a high-performance and decentralized EVM-compatible chain. Monad achieves its goal by reconstructing the execution layer and consensus layer, including establishing Monad DB and introducing Optimistic to support parallel and asynchronous transaction processing, and using the Monad BFT algorithm to accelerate the consensus process. At the same time, the reconstruction of the former two also reduces the hardware requirements of nodes and promotes decentralization of the network.

MegaETH focuses on improving single-threaded performance. It uses a single sorter to simplify transaction processing, reducing the hardware load of full nodes, and introduces new data structures to improve overall efficiency, achieving extreme performance. As Ethereum L2, it is mainly responsible for efficient transaction execution, and decentralization is achieved using Ethereum.

During this conversation, Keone and Lei showcased two different blockchain design philosophies that, despite significant differences in their implementation paths, share the same goal: to advance the development of the Ethereum ecosystem.

This technical debate not only reveals the cutting edge of current blockchain technology, but also provides inspiration for future innovation. Whether it is the deep optimization of Monad or the pursuit of high performance of MegaETH, these are major forces driving the advancement of blockchain technology. I believe that under the leadership of pioneers like Keone and Lei, the Ethereum ecosystem will usher in a brighter future.