Sei (@SeiNetwork) v6.6 is live as of block 224,201,091, making it the network's largest upgrade since EVM support launched in May 2024. The release bundles nearly 400 pull requests and, more
Sei (@SeiNetwork) v6.6 is live as of block 224,201,091, making it the network's largest upgrade since EVM support launched in May 2024. The release bundles nearly 400 pull requests and, more significantly, marks the first time Sei Giga components have touched mainnet.
The two headline changes in v6.6 each target a different layer of the stack. The release introduces the first pieces of two of the three major Giga upgrades: Eidos, a new storage layer that will begin moving the chain's history into its own database, and Ares, a rebuilt execution engine that will become the default path for running transactions.
Ares is now the default execution path on every upgraded node, and according to @Sei_Labs it delivers roughly 10x the throughput of the previous setup. With v6.6, Giga stops being a roadmap and starts being something running on mainnet: Eidos has begun moving history into storage built for scale, and Ares is now the default execution path.
The Eidos change addresses a structural inefficiency that has been present since EVM support arrived. Until now, Sei's EVM history and Cosmos state have shared the same database, meaning history reads compete with live activity and modules unrelated to the EVM still pay write costs for EVM data. Eidos separates them.EVM history will move into its own dedicated database, so reading old history stops competing with transactions happening in real time.
Beyond the Giga components, v6.6 patches more than 30 security issues spanning denial-of-service exposure and supply-chain hardening. Validator operations also get practical improvements, including faster pruning and retuned consensus timing to smooth out day-to-day operations.
Both Ares and Eidos are only the first step and will continue across future releases. v6.6 is a large release, with many fixes unrelated to Sei Giga. The third pillar of the Giga programme, a new Autobahn consensus mechanism, is not included in this release. Consensus, the third major part of the Giga upgrade, will only go live later.
The longer-term ambitions remain substantial. The full Giga upgrade targets over 200,000 transactions per second and sub-400 millisecond finality through the new Autobahn consensus mechanism and asynchronous parallel execution. Those figures remain forward-looking benchmarks rather than live metrics, but v6.6 represents the first concrete step toward them on a live network.
$SEI holders have been following Giga's progress since it was first outlined in late 2024, and the mainnet rollout is now underway in earnest.
Sources:Sei Labs Blog: Ares and Eidos, the first components of the Giga Upgrade, will go live in Sei 6.6Sei Docs: Sei Giga OverviewCrypto Briefing: Sei unveils Giga upgrade roadmap, targets 200,000 TPS and 400ms finality
