Cardano has reached a new milestone with the Plomin Hard Fork, which went live on January 29, 2025. Building on a series of previous upgrades (most notably Alonzo and Vasil), Plomin shifts the network’s focus from scalability and smart contracts to fully decentralised governance.
Under the framework of CIP-1694, every ADA holder now wields genuine voting rights over future protocol changes, treasury allocations, and hard fork proposals. This on-chain voting mechanism replaces the traditional reliance on core entities (Cardano Foundation, EMURGO, and Input Output Global), effectively entrusting the community to guide the blockchain’s evolution.
Before the upgrade, stakeholder readiness was evident: top exchanges signaled support, and most stake pool operators had already migrated to the required node version. Market sentiment remains cautiously positive, while ADA prices have seen typical short-term fluctuations, long-term observers view Plomin as a fundamental pivot towards true decentralisation.
This governance-first approach aims to enrich Cardano’s appeal among developers and DeFi projects, advancing the network’s ambition to serve as a robust, community-driven ecosystem.