Cardano completed the Van Rossum hard fork on July 18, with the main network upgraded to protocol version 11. This update has had little impact on ordinary ADA transfers, but reduced the implementation cost of smart contracts and paved the way for the Leos build-up planned for 2026.

First upgrade from chain governance

More concerned, this upgrade is no longer driven from top to bottom by the founder developer, Input Output. The proposal, discussion and approval process was completed through the Cardano chain-based governance system, and the ownership of the upgrade of the agreement began to shift to network participants.

  • Trustee representative support rate 78.97%, above 60% threshold
  • 7 members of the Constitutional Council
  • Conservatory pool operator support rate 53.02%

According to Cardanoscan data cited in the report, the network was switched to version 11 at epoch 644 and upgraded to enter into force at 21:44 UTC on 18 July. According to the Cardano Constitution, at least 85 per cent of active pledge nodes are required to run compatible software before upgrade, a percentage of about 93 per cent before activation.

Version 11 Adjusting smart contract capabilities

Technically, version 11, which is a hard fork in the same period, does not change the structure of the transaction and therefore requires less movement of wallets and users in general. Upon upgrade, the Plutus Smart Contract Platform added additional capabilities and harmonized the built-in functions in the three versions, allowing for earlier deployment applications to use the updated functionality.

The update also tightened some of the book-of-the-book verification rules, including preventing the repetition of the same encrypted identity key in two pledge pools. Input Output indicates that, in addition to improving the Plutus and cost models, this upgrade is also being prepared for the next Dijkstra phase.

Short-term user perceptions are still limited

For users holding or transferring ADAs, there is little visible change in the short term. The method of transfer remains the same, the wallet is usually not updated and the base cost of sending ADA is not adjusted.

The changes will first be reflected in the application level. As the costs of implementing smart contracts fall, future application of the DeFi, NFT markets and so on offers the opportunity to reduce the cost of interaction in the future, but this savings will not occur automatically, and developers will still need to rebuild or optimize contracts in order to channel cost changes to users.

The report mentions that subsequent upgrades that are more readily felt by users remain Leos. The programme ' s consensus-building for Cardano has been expanded with the objective of improving transaction processing without compromising security and is expected to move forward later in 2026.

Additional information:Van Rossum, this name comes from Cardano Governance contributor Max van Rosem. According to reports, he was involved in the design of the online constitution and died in October 2025.