ETH Pectra Upgrade FAQs

The Ethereum Pectra Upgrade is designed to improve the network’s efficiency, scalability, and usability. For institutions staking ETH on Coinbase Prime, Pectra introduces the following enhancements:

1. Reduced operational complexity: Each custody vault wallet will support staking up to 204,800 ETH, a 64x increase versus the current 3,200 ETH limit. This significantly reduces the number of wallets needed for large stakes, and the associated operational complexity.

2. Higher rewards with auto-compounding: Validator rewards will remain at the validator and automatically compound, yielding greater rewards. These pending rewards can be claimed in Coinbase Prime at any time for withdrawal, giving you the ability to claim rewards only if and when that fits your workflows.

3. Improved portfolio management: The upgrade will remove the restriction on multiples of 32 ETH. Clients will be able to precisely rebalance their percentage of staked ETH by freely staking in amounts >32 ETH and unstaking in amounts >1 ETH

Phase 1: Since October 9, 2025

In the first phase, Coinbase Prime will support Pectra for new staking actions only. New stakes from fully unstaked wallets will be routed to Pectra-enabled validators (0x02).

Note: Incremental staking from already partially staked wallets will be disabled to maintain a clean separation between validator types per wallet.

Any ETH already staked during this phase will remain on pre-Pectra validators.

Phase 2: Starting in H1 2026

During Phase 2, Coinbase Prime will consolidate and upgrade existing validators to 0x02 validators. Before supporting the Pectra Upgrade in Coinbase Prime later this year, we are adapting our ETH staking fee methodology to accommodate these changes. As a result, ETH staking fees will be calculated differently starting with the June billing cycle.

Starting with the June 2025 billing cycle, ETH staking fees will now be based on both distributed rewards and pending rewards. This change aligns with the real-time accrual of rewards and does not introduce new fees.

Two components will make up the ETH staking fee:

1. Distributed Rewards:
   ETH reward amount distributed at a given time multiplied by the current price of ETH in USD and the staking fee percentage.

2. Pending Rewards:
   Change in pending ETH rewards between the start and end of the day (UTC) multiplied by the price of ETH in USD at midnight UTC and the staking fee percentage. 

The total fee is the sum of the USD value of all distributed ETH rewards and the USD value of daily change in pending rewards, both multiplied by the staking fee rate. When pending rewards are distributed, the distributed amount increases and the pending amount decreases to avoid double-counting.

This methodology accommodates ETH staked to both current 0x01 validators and Pectra-enabled 0x02 validators.

During Phase 1, you have the option of unstaking your ETH and staking it again, which will automatically route it to Pectra-enabled 0x02 validators.

Please note that between unstaking and staking to an upgraded validator, you will miss rewards for a period of approximately 2-11 days, depending on network conditions.

While the Ethereum network supports validator sizes up to 2048 ETH, Coinbase Prime will target a size of 1800 ETH to leave headroom for auto-compounding rewards.

• The minimum stake remains 32 ETH.

• You no longer need to stake in multiples of 32 ETH.

• The maximum number of validators per Custody vault remains 100.

This means you can now stake up to 180,000 ETH per wallet — a ~55× increase over the previous limit of 3,200 ETH. Coinbase Prime supports changes to this default validator size for your Prime account if desired.

Yes, your ETH wallet addresses will remain the same. Once validators are consolidated during Phase 2, you will have your staked ETH on fewer ETH validators though. E.g., if you are staking 3200 ETH from one wallet to 100 validators today (32 ETH each), that stake will be merged into two Pectra-enabled validators during Phase 2.

Pending rewards remain visible in the Prime UI. To view them, hover over the lock icon next to the Balance column on the asset details page or check the ETH Validators page.

Rewards earned with a Pectra-enabled validator can be claimed without impacting the staked principal. Claims are partial withdrawals subject to the exit queue, and require a minimum of 1 ETH.

Pectra-enabled validators support auto-compounding of validator rewards, increasing your overall returns.
A validator’s earning capacity increases in 1 ETH increments. For example:

• 32 ETH → must reach 33 ETH to earn more from proposed blocks

• 33 ETH → must reach 34 ETH, and so on

Once a validator hits the maximum effective balance (MaxEB) of 2048 ETH, any additional Consensus Layer rewards are routed to the wallet rather than being auto-staked.

Transaction Rewards and MEV will continue to be distributed to your dedicated Transaction Rewards Wallet.

Yes, partial staking / unstaking will be supported for Pectra-enabled validators. Users will have the ability to partially stake a minimum of 32 ETH as well as partially unstake a minimum of 1 ETH. For 0x02 validators, there is no more need to stake or unstake in multiples of 32 ETH.