Most of us aren’t strangers to the word “fork.” Any high-consensus, large-scale project will encounter forks as it matures—think BTC and ETH. And speaking of timing, here’s a fork headline from today: according to an official announcement, Binance will support the Ethereum (ETH) network upgrade and hard fork. To prepare for the upgrade and hard fork, Binance will perform maintenance on the ETH wallet at 14:00 on November 26, 2025 (UTC+8).

Some say: “The rules of a blockchain are written in code, but its future is decided by consensus. Every ‘fork’ is the inevitable result of the co-evolution of technology, consensus, and the ecosystem.” What does that mean? In short, while a blockchain’s underlying logic is deterministic, its development path is determined by consensus—and every fork occurs when differences arise around a technical or ecosystem upgrade.

All in all, forks tend to happen around various chain upgrades, especially after rapid evolution across L1s, L2s, and rollup ecosystems. Yet many still hold a surface-level understanding: is a fork just a technical update? A community vote? A price event? Or an ecosystem reshuffle?

In reality, it’s all of the above.
Blockchains aren’t powerful because they “never change,” but because they can continually “self-evolve” via forking mechanisms. Today, we’ll explain soft and hard forks in the clearest, deepest, and most practical way.

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Why must blockchains “fork”? The industry’s most misunderstood question

Outsiders often view forks as “chaos” or “conflict,” but true blockchain participants know: forking is the lifeblood of the blockchain world.

In Web2, companies call the shots. In blockchains:

• There’s no boss
  
  

• No CEO
  
  

• No central server
  
  

• No one can force you to upgrade
  
  

Every chain is like a sovereign nation, and all nodes, miners, and validators are its “citizens.”
To amend the law (chain rules), you need “social consensus,” and the forking mechanism is how this “nation” legitimately changes its rules.

Forks arise from four fundamental needs:

1) Performance improvements: throughput, fees, and latency never stop being issues

Whether BTC, ETH, or the fastest L2, performance isn’t static. Whenever users surge, you’ll see:

• Insufficient TPS
  
  

• Elevated gas fees
  
  

• Block congestion
  
  

• On-chain activity competing for resources
  
  

The community proposes upgrades that often redefine block formats, gas mechanics, or consensus parameters—making forks inevitable (and yes, disagreements over upgrade approaches). Performance upgrades are the most common driver of forks.

2) Security: the longer a chain lives, the more it must patch vulnerabilities

Blockchains aren’t “absolutely secure”—they become “more secure over time.” Early on, any chain may face:

• Transaction-validation bugs
  
  

• Timestamp issues
  
  

• Consensus sync delays
  
  

• State-calculation errors
  
  

• Economic-incentive design flaws
  
  

Large chains undergo security upgrades almost annually, and fixing flaws often means changing old rules—thus requiring a fork.

3) New features: ecosystem expansion needs new rules

Ethereum’s journey from PoW → PoS and from EVM extensions to various scaling components is a textbook “feature-iteration-driven fork,” e.g.:

• Extending virtual-machine capabilities
  
  

• Adding new precompiles (e.g., ZK-related)
  
  

• Supporting new rollup modes
  
  

• Introducing entirely new execution or data-layer logic
  
  

Each new feature alters underlying rules, so you “upgrade the language” via a fork.

4) Economic-model adjustments: incentives are the soul of a blockchain

A chain isn’t only technology—it’s also economics, which must evolve:

• Change inflation rate?
  
  

• Modify the gas model?
  
  

• Alter miner/validator rewards?
  
  

• Introduce new burn mechanics?
  
  

Economic parameters directly affect fairness, security, and sustainability—another frequent reason to fork.

Bottom line: Forks aren’t chaos; they’re the core mechanism of blockchain evolution. Without forks, there is no future for blockchains.

Soft forks: a gentle, backward-compatible “gradual evolution”

A soft fork is a backward-compatible upgrade. In short: the new rules are stricter, but old nodes still accept new blocks. That’s the essence of a soft fork—no breaking old systems, no forcing everyone to upgrade immediately.

1) Why are soft forks compatible with old nodes?

One sentence: a soft fork narrows old rules rather than expanding them. For example:

• Old rule: block size ≤ 1 MB
  
  

• New rule: block size ≤ 0.9 MB
  
  

Old nodes still deem such blocks valid (they satisfy the old rule), while new nodes enforce the stricter limit. Result: old nodes do not reject new blocks.

Since old nodes don’t reject new blocks, the chain doesn’t split and everything runs smoothly—that’s the logic behind a “quiet” soft-fork upgrade.

2) Common soft-fork moves

Soft forks typically involve:

• Adding stricter validation logic
  
  

• Imposing extra constraints on transaction formats
  
  

• Disabling certain operations
  
  

• Introducing additional rules without confusing old parsers
  
  

In other words, soft forks “don’t disturb old logic” while enhancing the chain.

3) Why do major chains prefer soft forks?

• Lowest community cost: not everyone must upgrade simultaneously; consensus remains intact.
  
  

• Lowest risk: no two chains, no new coins, no mapping headaches.
  
  

• User invisible: exchanges, wallets, staking, and apps keep running.
  
  

• Ecosystem continuity: big chains avoid “splits” at all costs; soft forks enable the smoothest evolution.
  
  

Thus BTC, ETH, Solana, and many L2s default to soft-fork paths.

Hard forks: a non-backward-compatible “structural reset”

If a soft fork is “iOS 14 → 14.1,” a hard fork is “iOS 14 → iOS 18”—a full system remodel. New and old rules do not recognize each other, and nodes can’t mutually validate blocks.

Because they’re incompatible, the outcome is obvious: the chain splits into two versions.

1) Why can’t hard forks support old nodes?

Hard forks expand rules. For example:

• Old rule: block size ≤ 1 MB
  
  

• New rule: block size ≤ 2 MB
  
  

When a new node proposes a 1.8 MB block:

• It’s valid to new nodes
  
  

• It’s invalid to old nodes (>1 MB)
  
  

• Old nodes reject it
  
  

• Sync breaks immediately
  
  

Two chains then diverge:

• One led by the new rules
  
  

• One led by the old rules
  
  

That’s the essence of hard-fork chain splits.

2) Consequences—an industry-wide “seismic event”

• Two independent chains
  
  

• Two asset systems (two coins)
  
  

• Split among nodes, miners, validators
  
  

• Wallets, exchanges, and tooling must be rebuilt
  
  

• Liquidity is divided
  
  

• Narratives are reshaped
  
  

Serious? Absolutely. In this industry, a hard fork is a big event—not merely technical, but systemic.

3) When is a hard fork unavoidable?

Despite the cost, some scenarios demand it:

• Rule-rewrite upgrades: architecture overhauls, VM changes, consensus transitions
  
  

• Fundamental incompatibility: new features old rules can’t parse
  
  

• Core economic redesign: e.g., radically new rewards or gas models
  
  

• Irreconcilable ideology: communities part ways, each with its own chain
  
  

In short: a hard fork is the most thorough “rebirth” a blockchain can undergo.

System-level view: the fundamental differences

• Block-validation rules differ:
  Soft forks tighten rules; hard forks expand them.

• Impact on node ecosystems differs:
  Soft fork → upgrade optional;
  Hard fork → upgrade mandatory (or you’re on the old chain).
  
  

• Impact on ecosystem development differs:
  Soft fork = steady, continuous evolution;
  Hard fork = rebuild the civilizational stack.
  
  

Neither is inherently “good” or “bad”—they fit different scenarios.

In the L1, L2, and rollup era, fork mechanics are structurally changing

With 2024–2025 ushering in multi-layered ecosystems, forking isn’t just a single-chain act—it spans cross-chain coordination.

1) Rollups upgrade far faster than L1s; soft forks become high-frequency

Rollups are the leading scaling path and behave like rapidly iterating app-chains—upgrades feel like Web2 software releases. Common patterns:

• Frequent soft forks
  
  

• Weekly updates
  
  

• Constantly improving compression, data availability, proving systems
  
  

This “lightweight fork culture” is accelerating the crypto world’s iteration speed.

2) Major L1s prefer soft forks (to avoid political schisms)

The more mature the L1, the less it can stomach a hard fork:

• Large market cap
  
  

• Massive ecosystems
  
  

• Rich DApp landscapes
  
  

• Complex exchange integrations
  
  

• The cost of a hard fork is simply too high
  
  

Hence L1s increasingly favor soft-fork, incremental upgrades.

3) AppChains fork more like Web2 product updates

AppChains are smaller and nimbler; their forks feel like “version bumps” without heavy consensus politics. Upgrades are more flexible, and even hard forks rarely pose systemic risk.

Soft/Hard fork trends: the industry is entering a “gentle-upgrade era”

Trend 1: Ethereum leads the soft-fork era, avoiding systemic splits
Post-PoS, ETH leans toward:

• Modularity
  
  

• Incremental upgrades
  
  

• Soft-fork priority
  
  

• Emphasis on ecosystem continuity
  
  

• Hard forks only when absolutely necessary
  
  

Trend 2: Rollups become high-frequency iterators
As “upgradable application chains,” rollups upgrade more like auto-updating software—soft forks will be routine.

Trend 3: Hard forks serve as “ecosystem reboots” (non-mainstream chains)
Smaller, stalled, or struggling chains will rely more on hard forks to “start over.”

Trend 4: Regulation increasingly shapes fork paths
Expect cases like:

• Hard forks driven by regulatory demands
  
  

• Soft forks for privacy adjustments
  
  

• Parameter tweaks for compliance
  
  

Chain evolution is no longer purely technical—it’s the intersection of regulation and engineering.

Trend 5: Forks become more automated, predictable, and low-cost
Infrastructure is maturing:

• Automated upgrade tooling
  
  

• Compatibility testing
  
  

• State-migration tech
  
  

• Decentralized governance processes
  
  

Forks will feel more like “routine maintenance,” not “major political events.”

Trend 6: Exchanges play an ever more critical role
In fork seasons:

• Liquidity determines which chain users view as “main”
  
  

• Exchanges shape the public’s main-chain perception
  
  

• Forked coins’ circulation hinges on exchange support
  
  

• User asset safety relies on exchange guarantees
  
  

Platforms like SuperEx will matter more than ever.

Conclusion: Forks aren’t chaos—they’re how blockchains evolve

Back to the original question: why do all chains need to fork?
Because the magic of blockchains isn’t in “never changing,” but in “getting better without centralized decision-making.”

• Soft forks deliver gentle evolution;
  
  

• Hard forks deliver structural restarts.
  
  

Together, they outline the evolutionary path of blockchains for decades to come.