The Ethereum Foundation announced the launch of Hoodi, a new Ethereum testnet designed to facilitate validator lifecycle testing following issues encountered during the Pectra testnet activation on Holesky. While Sepolia recovered smoothly after deposit contract configuration changes caused client issues across testnets, Holesky experienced extensive inactivity leaks during its recovery. Although Holesky has since finalized, the resulting queue of exited validators will take approximately one year to fully process, preventing efficient testing of complete validator exits.

To resolve this issue, staking operators and infrastructure providers are advised to transition to Hoodi for comprehensive validator testing. Hoodi is scheduled to activate the Pectra network upgrade at epoch 2048, which occurs on Wednesday, March 26, 2025, at 14:37:12 UTC. To ensure a smooth migration, the Ethereum Foundation will continue supporting Holesky until September 30, 2025. Stakers can still utilize Holesky to test deposits, consolidations, and other Pectra features, while client developers will also use Holesky for gas limit increases and protocol stress tests.

Supported consensus layer software releases for Hoodi include Grandine version 1.0.1, Lighthouse version 7.0.0-beta.4, Lodestar version 1.28.0 (or version 1.28.1 for multi-client setups), Nimbus version 25.3.1, Prysm version 5.3.2, and Teku version 25.3.0. On the execution layer, supported client releases include Besu 25.3.0, Erigon 3.0.0, go-ethereum 1.15.6, Nethermind 1.31.6, and Reth 1.3.3. Both consensus layer beacon nodes and validator clients must be updated for validator operators participating in the upgraded testnet environment.

The Ethereum Foundation outlined specific operational roles and lifespans for each testnet. Sepolia remains dedicated to application and tooling developers, with an expected end of life on September 30, 2026, and a planned replacement launching in March 2026. Hoodi serves validators and staking providers with an expected end of life on September 30, 2028, whereas Holesky will reach its end of life on September 30, 2025.