Berachain Testnet V1 vs V2
Berachain's V1 testnet (Artio) was built on top of Polaris, which tightly coupled EVM execution with Cosmos consensus. However, the ecosystem's demands in terms of transaction volume and engagement highlighted several limitations to this architecture.
The Berachain Foundation has iterated on and re-architected this framework, resulting in BeaconKit. With Berachain's V2 testnet, the initial problems faced during V1 have been resolved, resulting in a stable and highly-performant network.
Where a V1 validator would solely run the Polaris client, a V2 validator would run the BeaconKit client (for consensus) alongside any EVM execution client (e.g. Geth, Erigon). This modular approach allows for specialization of concerns - for the execution layer to benefit from EVM innovations, and for BeaconKit to provide a highly customizable and performant consensus layer.
Main Changes from V1 to V2
In addition to the technical changes with BeaconKit, the economic design of Berachain's native tokens has evolved. The following table highlights the main changes between V1 and V2:
Some significant points to note:
- $BERA is staked for activating validators, rather than $BGT.
- $BGT delegators no longer at risk of slashing.
- The execution environment is now EVM identical.
Key Benefits
Technical enhancements aside, the economic changes to how tokens operate on Berachain V2 have several benefits:
- Additional $BERA utility is provided
- $BGT adopts a purely economic role, gating PoL and all native chain incentives
BeaconKit vs Polaris
With Berachain V1 (Using Polaris), the chain was a tightly coupled EVM execution with Cosmos consensus integrated into a single binary. With the extreme transaction volumes the Berachain V1 testnet experienced, it became apparent that this approach would not scale.
BeaconKit provides a modular building block granting single-slot finality through the CometBFT consensus algorithm. Developers can use BeaconKit to run any EVM execution client implementing the EngineAPI.
