TL;DR:
BNB Chain activated the Osaka/Mendel hard fork, a network upgrade composed of nine BNB Evolution Proposals (BEPs). The hard fork combines six EIPs selected from Ethereum with two network-specific improvements, all chosen for their corroborated impact on execution efficiency, stability and usability under real load conditions.
The upgrade builds on the performance improvements introduced by the Fermi and Maxwell upgrades, aiming to refine network behavior when blocks are produced in under one second. By correcting minor inefficiencies that become critical in high-throughput scenarios—such as gas spikes, computationally heavy operations and inconsistent execution—Osaka/Mendel delivers more predictable gas prices, tighter execution limits and faster, more reliable transaction finality.
Among the most relevant technical changes are upper limits for computationally intensive operations, including modular exponentiation, along with caps on gas per transaction and adjustments to gas costs to better reflect actual resource usage. These modifications reduce unexpected behavior for developers and ensure consistent transaction outcomes even during peak activity periods.
The hard fork also introduces the CLZ opcode for leading zero counting, a more efficient low-level tool that does not alter application-level behavior. In addition, a clear limit on block size is established, preventing excessively heavy blocks from affecting overall processing performance as network activity scales.
The two BNB Chain-specific improvements also bring substantial changes. Blob transactions are now limited by block number, preventing large data payloads from degrading performance. The Fast Finality mechanism was enhanced through an in-memory voting pool, resulting in faster and more reliable transaction confirmations. A new JSON-RPC method gives developers greater visibility into node configuration, simplifying debugging and infrastructure management.
Osaka/Mendel consolidates the trajectory initiated by Fermi, Maxwell and Pascal, strengthening the core of BNB Chain without introducing unnecessary complexity.
