Solana News: Alpenglow Upgrade Scheduled for Oct. 21 With a 150-Millisecond Finality Target

• Solana has scheduled its Alpenglow upgrade for Oct. 21, targeting transaction finality in about 150 milliseconds.

• Alpenglow replaces TowerBFT, the voting system Solana has used since its launch in 2020.

• Validator votes move off-chain, so vote transactions will no longer appear in blocks.

• Validators must run Agave 4.3.0. Firedancer and Frankendancer operators will need to switch software temporarily.

• Validator voting charges of roughly 1 SOL per epoch are replaced by a flat 0.8 SOL admission fee.

• The migration is set for epoch 1064, expected around 15:00 UTC on Oct. 21.

Solana has scheduled Oct. 21 for Alpenglow, a major upgrade aimed at making transactions irreversible in roughly 150 milliseconds. It changes how the computers running the network agree on payments.

The Solana Foundation’s updated timetable sets a date for replacing TowerBFT. The 150-millisecond figure remains a target, and actual performance will depend on network conditions.

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Solana News: Alpenglow Upgrade at a Glance

Key details:

• Upgrade: Alpenglow

• Date: Oct. 21 (epoch 1064, expected around 15:00 UTC)

• Replaces: TowerBFT, in use since Solana’s launch in 2020

• Finality target: about 150 milliseconds

• Validator software: Agave 4.3.0 required

• Validator fee change: about 1 SOL per epoch in voting charges replaced by a flat 0.8 SOL admission fee

• Old voting system runs for: the first 5,000 slots

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Main News: Solana Sets Oct. 21 for Alpenglow

The Solana Foundation published an updated timetable that sets Oct. 21 for replacing TowerBFT. Alpenglow aims to make a transaction irreversible in roughly 150 milliseconds.

The 150-millisecond figure is a target, not a guarantee.

How Alpenglow Changes Validator Voting

Today, validators, the computers that check transactions and help secure Solana, submit their votes as transactions recorded on the blockchain.

Under Alpenglow, validators exchange votes directly. They combine enough approvals into a certificate that finalizes a block after one or two voting rounds.

Because votes move off-chain, vote transactions will no longer appear in blocks. That changes how headline transaction counts are measured.

Traders who monitor Solana network activity and validator data can follow live data through SpotX.

What Validators Need to Do

• Software: operators need software built on Agave 4.3.0.

• Firedancer and Frankendancer: these alternative validator programs will not support the initial migration, so their operators will need to switch temporarily.

• Fees: voting charges of roughly 1 SOL per epoch disappear and are replaced by a flat admission fee of 0.8 SOL.

An epoch is a period during which Solana assigns validators their network responsibilities.

Migration Timeline: October 21

• Epoch: 1064

• Expected start: around 15:00 UTC on Oct. 21

• Old voting system: used for the first 5,000 slots, the short windows assigned for block production

• Switch to Alpenglow: roughly 18 minutes after the epoch begins

Solana Market Snapshot

Prices from the CoinDesk market ticker alongside the report:

• Solana (SOL): $107.31 (-1.17%)

• Bitcoin (BTC): $83,492.95 (-0.25%)

• Ethereum (ETH): $2,505.57 (-1.05%)

• XRP: $1.37 (-0.71%)

• Hyperliquid (HYPE): $82.02 (-1.46%)

• CoinDesk 20 (CD20): $2,317.17 (-0.77%)

Summary: Solana News Today

Solana has scheduled Alpenglow for Oct. 21. The upgrade replaces TowerBFT with off-chain validator voting and targets about 150-millisecond finality.

• Date: epoch 1064, around 15:00 UTC on Oct. 21

• Target: about 150 milliseconds

• Software: Agave 4.3.0 required

• Fees: flat 0.8 SOL admission fee replaces voting charges of roughly 1 SOL per epoch

• Handover: old voting system runs for the first 5,000 slots, then Alpenglow takes over

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