It feels like every week there's a new Layer 2, but the "Modular" approach—separating execution, settlement, and data availability—seems to be the winning strategy lately. Is the era of the "Monolithic" blockchain like the original Ethereum or Solana officially over, or do they still have a performance advantage in specific niche use cases like high-frequency trading?
3 answers
The modular thesis has definitely taken over for general-purpose apps. By offloading data availability to specialized layers like Celestia or Avail, Layer 2s have dropped their fees by another 90% this year. However, I wouldn't count out monolithic chains entirely. For things like decentralized exchanges that need absolute minimum latency, having everything on one layer still provides a speed advantage that modular stacks can't quite match yet due to the overhead of cross-layer communication. It’s less of a "war" and more of a specialization where both have their place in the ecosystem.
Does this modularity make the ecosystem too fragmented for the average user who just wants to send a payment without worrying about which layer they are on?
Modularity is about flexibility. Developers can now "mix and match" the best layers for their specific app, which is huge for innovation.
Exactly, Monica. Brandon’s question hits on the core shift: we’ve moved from building "one chain for everything" to "the best chain for this specific thing."
Tyler, fragmentation is the biggest "growing pain" of 2026. Luckily, "Cross-Chain Intent" protocols are starting to solve this. You just send the funds, and the "solvers" in the background find the most efficient modular path to get it there. The user experience is being unified even if the backend is getting more complex and fragmented.