Cardano Founder Predicts Ethereum's Obsolescence Within 15 Years

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has launched a scathing critique of Ethereum, predicting that the leading smart contract platform will become obsolete within the next decade. Hoskinson compared Ethereum to once-dominant tech brands like MySpace and Blackberry, arguing that Ethereum is a victim of its own success and now faces mounting threats from both internal inefficiencies and rising competitors.

During a surprise AMA session on Wednesday, Hoskinson stated, “I don’t think Ethereum will survive more than 10 to 15 years.” He elaborated that the layer-2 solutions, which are designed to improve Ethereum's scalability, will eventually drain the platform of its value, leading users to migrate to other platforms. He also predicted that Bitcoin-based decentralized finance (DeFi) will eventually surpass Ethereum in terms of total value locked (TVL), drawing more users away from the Ethereum ecosystem.

Hoskinson, one of Ethereum’s original eight co-founders, claimed that Ethereum’s trajectory is unsustainable, following a fallout with Vitalik Buterin in 2014. He argued that the growing complexity of Ethereum's scaling roadmap, centered around rollups and layer-2 solutions, will ultimately fracture the ecosystem and alienate users. He further suggested that Bitcoin-based decentralized finance (DeFi), which is slowly gaining traction, will eventually surpass Ethereum in terms of total value locked (TVL), drawing more users away from the Ethereum ecosystem.

This isn’t the first time Hoskinson has taken aim at Ethereum. Last September, he described the network as a “dictatorship,” accusing Buterin of holding excessive sway over the platform’s development. “Ethereum’s entire vision starts and ends with Vitalik,” he asserted at the time, criticizing the shift away from sharding in favor of layer-2 scalability. He elaborated that, unlike Bitcoin’s simple and stable protocol, Ethereum chose to “pick a king,” claiming Buterin’s decisions, such as backing rollups, have led to a fragmented ecosystem dominated by what he calls “extractive L2s.”

However, some Ethereum supporters have argued otherwise. While Buterin plays a key role in shaping Ethereum’s vision, governance is more decentralized than Hoskinson implies. The protocol incorporates community proposals (EIPs), developer discussions, and guidance from the Ethereum Foundation. Meanwhile, despite the tensions, Hoskinson showed some openness last Sunday, responding positively to Buterin’s technical proposal advocating for a shift to RISC-V architecture from the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).

“It makes sense,” he said, referencing Cardano’s own exploration of RISC-V with BitVMX. The nod is significant as Cardano has also been exploring RISC-V through its BitVMX initiative. Notably, Cardano’s extended UTxO model is now being integrated with BitVMX FORCE, a collaborative project that aims to enable Cardano dApps to access Bitcoin liquidity and unlock new layers of DeFi potential.