ETH Gas Fee Revolution: Unveiling the Secrets Behind Low-Cost Ethereum Transactions in 2026

“Layer 2 network Gas fees have been reduced by up to 100 times.”

According to the latest real-time data from Ethereum block explorer Etherscan, as of January 5, 2026, executing a low-priority regular transaction costs approximately 0.039 Gwei (less than $0.01). Even with high priority, it only costs 0.043 Gwei.

Meanwhile, the price of Ethereum (ETH) on Gate once surged past $3,200 today, showing a steady upward trend.

01 Current ETH Gas Fee Situation

The Ethereum network is currently operating at historically low Gas fee levels. According to real-time data from Etherscan Gas Tracker, Gas prices for low, standard, and high speeds are all hovering around 0.04 Gwei.

This means that performing a token swap costs about $0.04 to $0.05, and selling an NFT costs about $0.07 to $0.08. This is a stark contrast to the situation a year ago or even a few months ago.

At the same time, the network remains healthy. The latest block height has exceeded 24.16 million, with approximately 69,000 pending transactions in the queue, and an average block utilization rate of 38.66%. This indicates that while the network is under load, it is far from congestion.

02 Data Trends Showing Significant Drop in Gas Fees

The decline in Gas fees is not a short-term anomaly but a clear long-term trend. Data from YCharts shows that the average Gas price on Ethereum has fallen from 13.96 Gwei a year ago to 0.4619 Gwei on January 3, 2026.

This represents an astonishing 96.69% year-over-year decrease. The change has been especially noticeable recently, with the average Gas price dropping by over 50% from early December 2025 to early January 2026.

Historically, Gas fee volatility was common, but since the second half of 2025, the fee curve has noticeably flattened and remained at low levels. This aligns closely with the pace of Ethereum network upgrade roadmaps.

03 Technical Drivers Behind the Drop in Gas Fees

The significant reduction in Ethereum Gas fees is mainly due to the successful implementation of its “Rollup-centric” scaling roadmap. The two most critical upgrades were the Pectra upgrade in May 2025 and the Fusaka upgrade in December 2025.

The Pectra upgrade’s core was doubling Blob throughput, directly reducing data availability costs for Layer 2 networks, leading to a drastic decrease in Layer 2 transaction fees.

The Fusaka upgrade introduced more flexible PeerDAS (Peer-to-Peer Data Availability Sampling) technology and phased the Gas Limit from 30 million to 60 million. This allows the network to adjust capacity flexibly without hard forks, while limiting Gas per transaction to ensure security.

04 Practical Gas Fee Optimization Tips

For ordinary users and developers, while enjoying the reduction in network base fees, proactive strategies can further optimize costs.

Choose transaction timing: Monitor real-time network status, avoid peak hours overlapping with European and American markets, and transact during relatively idle periods.

Leverage Layer 2 networks: For non-urgent activities, shift major operations to Layer 2 solutions like Arbitrum and Optimism, which typically have much lower fees than the mainnet, and settle finally on the mainnet.

Batch transactions: Combine multiple operations into a single transaction to amortize fixed costs. For example, batch multiple token approvals or transfers.

Smart contract optimization: Developers can optimize smart contracts from storage layout, data type choices (preferably using bytes32), and Gas refund mechanisms to reduce execution costs at the source.

05 Future Outlook and Gate Ecosystem

Ethereum’s scaling journey continues. The 2026 roadmap focuses on further increasing Gas Limit (targeting 200 million per block) and transitioning to ZK proof verification.

Additionally, the Ethereum Interoperability Layer (EIL), aimed at solving Layer 2 fragmentation issues, is expected to be deployed by mid-2026, aiming to reduce cross-chain operation time and costs by several orders of magnitude.

As a leading global cryptocurrency exchange, Gate remains aligned with cutting-edge technological ecosystems. On Gate, users can conveniently trade ETH and various high-quality assets based on Ethereum and its Layer 2 networks, enjoying secure and efficient trading experiences.

Future Outlook

Today, a typical Uniswap token swap costs around $0.04 in Gas fees. A year ago, similar transactions could easily cost over $10.

This systemic change is driven by the fact that over 30% of ETH is staked, worth approximately $17.6 billion, forming a solid security foundation for the network.

Meanwhile, daily trading volume on mainstream Layer 2 networks continues to surpass that of the mainnet, yet total fees remain much lower, confirming the effectiveness of the scaling roadmap. This is not just a reduction in costs but also signifies that Ethereum’s usability as a global settlement layer is entering a new phase.