Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) Meaning

An Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) is a formal document used to propose changes to Ethereum. It’s the standard mechanism for describing, discussing, and eventually implementing modifications to the protocol and its surrounding standards. Ethereum is open-source and does not have a central product team deciding features behind closed doors, so EIPs provide a structured way for developers, researchers, application builders, and other stakeholders to coordinate changes.

If you’ve ever seen Bitcoin Improvement Proposals (BIPs), EIPs play a similar role for Ethereum. EIPs cover a wide range of things. Some propose core protocol changes-rules that affect transaction validity, block structure, or how the network reaches consensus.

Others propose standards that make the ecosystem more interoperable, such as token interfaces and signing formats. In practice, when Ethereum ships a major network upgrade, it’s typically the implementation of a selected set of EIPs that the community and client teams have agreed are ready and valuable. This is important: “Ethereum upgrades” are not vague events; they’re bundles of specific EIPs that node software must implement to stay in sync with the network.

Not every EIP becomes part of Ethereum. Proposals go through drafting, community review, iteration, and sometimes years of debate. Some are rejected, some become obsolete, and some are accepted but take a long time to schedule into a fork because they require careful security review and coordination.

The governance here is “rough consensus and running code” more than voting: adoption happens when the ecosystem-client teams, validators, exchanges, major dapps-converges on implementing the change. EIPs also matter beyond protocol upgrades because many of the standards developers rely on are defined through the EIP process.

“ERCs” (Ethereum Request for Comments) are a family of standards-like ERC-20 or ERC-721-that usually begin life in the EIP repository and are discussed through the same process. So when you see a wallet support a new signing standard, or a token become widely compatible across dapps, there’s a good chance an EIP/ECR standardization effort is what made that consistency possible.