Two Ethereum builders produce 88% of blocks in October

In October, two block builders, Beaverbuild and Titan Builder, produced 88.7% of Ethereum (CRYPTO:ETH) blocks, raising concerns about potential centralisation on the network. 

Researcher Toni Wahrstätter highlighted this trend in an October 17 post, attributing it to the rise of private order flow (XOF), which reduces competition among builders and centralises block production.

Decentralisation is critical for Ethereum to maintain its security and decentralisation ethos. 

If centralised entities control block production, they could theoretically prioritise or exclude certain transactions, which could compromise the network's integrity.

However, some analysts, like Ryan Lee, Bitget Research’s chief analyst, do not see this as a major centralisation threat. 

Lee noted that Ethereum’s proposer-builder separation ensures proposers cannot view the contents of the blocks proposed by builders, and only select the most profitable block for validation. 

He explained, "Neither builders nor validators can control which transactions are included on-chain or which are excluded."

Despite Ethereum’s robust consensus model, concerns about the power of influential validators remain. 

Kishan Kumar, a software engineer, previously noted that entities controlling significant mining power could exploit maximal extractable value (MEV) incentives to reorder or exclude transactions, which could impact decentralisation.

Wahrstätter emphasised that while Ethereum is working on improving censorship resistance, challenges like private order flow could continue to pose centralisation risks.

Despite these concerns, Ethereum’s validator count has grown by over 30% in the past year, driven by institutional adoption, which indicates positive momentum toward greater decentralisation.

At the time of writing, the Ethereum (ETH) price was $2,615.82.