ENS seeks approval for major .eth domain upgrade

Ethereum Name Service (ENS) has moved closer to launching its ENSv2 upgrade after founder Nick Johnson submitted a governance proposal seeking approval to activate the new naming system on Ethereum mainnet.

Johnson submitted the executable draft proposal on October 11, outlining plans to stop new registrations through the original .eth registrar and transfer future registrations to ENSv2. Existing domain holders would retain their names without mandatory migration, while ENS Labs would surrender its remaining administrative control over the upgraded system to the ENS DAO after activation. The proposal remains in draft form, with no confirmed voting date.

ENSv2 upgrade would temporarily pause new .eth registrations

Under the proposed activation process, ENS would stop allowing new .eth registrations through its original registrar before opening the upgraded system. Johnson explained that the transition requires a final synchronization of existing domain records to preserve ownership when ENSv2 becomes operational.

The activation would take place through five stages, beginning with the deployment of new smart contracts and the reservation of existing domain names. ENS Labs said it had already deployed the ENSv2 contracts to Ethereum mainnet, although the new registrar had not been authorized to process registrations.

Once the DAO approves and executes the proposal, the existing registrar would stop accepting new names. ENS Labs would then synchronize registrations made or renewed since its earlier snapshot, ensuring those records are included before the upgraded registrar becomes active.

Johnson expects the process between the initial freeze and ENSv2 activation to take several hours. During that period, users would be unable to register new .eth names through either system. Other naming operations would continue through the existing protocol, although the proposal notes that renewals may face temporary restrictions during the transition.

According to the proposal, ENS Labs would enable the new registrar after completing the final synchronization. The team would then update the Universal Resolver to direct domain lookups through ENSv2, allowing applications and wallets to use the upgraded naming system.

Existing ENS domain holders will keep their names

For users who already own .eth domains, Johnson said the upgrade would not require immediate action. Existing names would continue resolving through the current records, and holders could maintain ownership through the regular renewal process.

“If you own a .eth name and do nothing, it keeps working,” Johnson stated in the proposal.

ENS Labs has reserved existing eligible .eth names in the upgraded registry for their current owners. The arrangement allows holders to move their domains into ENSv2 through the official ENS application when they choose, without a fixed migration deadline.

The upgrade introduces changes to domain expiration rules. Under ENSv1, expired .eth names receive a 90-day grace period, while ENSv2 reduces that period to 28 days. To maintain the same effective expiration timeline during migration, the protocol would extend migrated domain expiration dates by 62 days.

Names that expired beyond their grace periods before the migration would not receive reservations. According to Johnson, such domains would become available for registration through the upgraded system.

The planned changes follow earlier ENSv2 development plans for Ethereum domain management, which introduced a redesigned naming structure intended to make domain ownership and permissions easier to manage.

ENSv2 introduces new domain controls and permissions

ENSv2 replaces the original registry’s flat structure with a system of connected registries, giving domain owners more control over names and subdomains.

Under the current design, ENS stores ownership information, resolver details and other records in a shared registry. Additional contracts have been introduced over time to manage permissions and more advanced naming features.

Johnson explained that the new architecture would let individual domains maintain their own registries for subdomains. Owners could choose custom registry and resolver implementations, while permissions would be assigned through specific roles.

For example, a user could grant another person permission to update a subdomain’s resolver without allowing that person to transfer ownership. The system is designed to support more precise access controls without requiring the existing NameWrapper structure for every operation.

The proposal notes that developers will need to update applications and integrations to work with ENSv2 through the Universal Resolver. ENS Labs said most integrations were already prepared, although the transition would still require coordination across participating services.

Administrative control is another part of the activation plan. Once ENSv2 is fully operational, ENS Labs intends to transfer its remaining privileged roles over the upgraded contracts to the DAO and renounce those permissions.

Following the handover, the DAO would control ENSv2 through its governance contracts. Registration fees would continue flowing to the DAO-controlled system, with the relevant contracts already configured to recognize the DAO timelock as their owner.

The upgrade follows the ENS DAO foundation restructuring approved in August 2026, which established a five-member governing board and expanded the foundation’s operational responsibilities.

ENS DAO must approve the upgrade before activation

Before ENSv2 can launch through the proposed process, Johnson’s draft must advance to a formal onchain governance vote. The ENS DAO requires executable proposals to meet a participation threshold and receive sufficient support from voting tokenholders.

According to the official governance documentation, executable proposals require a quorum of 1% of ENS voting supply, equivalent to one million affirmative votes, and majority approval. Once voting begins, tokenholders have seven days to participate.

If the proposal passes, execution would remain subject to a two-day timelock. The governance system uses this waiting period before approved contract changes can take effect.

The executable draft includes 15 smart contract calls that would be carried out as one transaction. These operations cover registrar permissions, contract ownership, resolver configuration and removal of existing registration controllers.

Johnson noted that the initial registrar freeze could be reversed through another DAO proposal if problems arose before ENSv2 activation. Once users begin migrating their names, however, the proposal says those individual migrations cannot be reversed through the same process.

The October governance bulletin continues to list ENSv2 activation as pending, with discussion open and no completed vote recorded.

ENS Labs has not announced an exact Mainnet activation date. The team expects to publish transaction records and a verification script after completing the administrative handover, allowing community members to check that ENS Labs no longer holds privileged permissions over the upgraded contracts.