Solana Block Capacity Jumps 66% in New Developer Upgrade

Solana core developers submitted the SIMD-0286 upgrade proposal to increase the network’s per-block compute limit from 60 million to 100 million compute units, representing a 66% capacity increase.

The current 60 million compute unit cap was implemented through SIMD-0256 on July 23, up from the previous 48 million limit. Solana blocks processes for 400 milliseconds, during which validators execute computational work within the set limit.

The proposed increase targets “compute budget exceeded” errors that affect high-intensity applications including order-book decentralized exchanges and MEV auctioneers. Restaking protocols, NFT mints, and DePIN projects would also benefit from the expanded capacity.

Lucas Bruder, CEO of Jito Labs and author of SIMD-0286, stated in the proposal that “current mainnet traffic is largely not constrained by large block execution times. This proposal aims for a substantial increase in block limits to 100 M CUs, in order to provide additional capacity to the network.”

Helius CEO Mert Mumtaz explained that the previous 48 million CU limit meant “the sum total of all transactions for a given block must be around this number.” He said the July upgrade to 60 million units delivers “lower fees, given the same demand, more expressiveness for devs, and better UX for users.”

SIMD-0286 was published on GitHub in May 2025 and remains under discussion. Implementation requires validator software upgrades and consensus. Once approved, the new 100 million compute unit limit will activate automatically at a future epoch.

Each transaction and smart contract call on Solana consumes compute units, similar to gas on Ethereum. The higher limit enables more computational work per block, allowing larger transaction volumes within the same time frame.