23-4-2025 – The Solana Foundation has unveiled sweeping reforms to its validator ecosystem. The cornerstone of this transformation lies in a carefully calibrated approach to network participation.
Under the fresh guidelines, the Foundation’s Delegation Programme will undergo significant restructuring, with a particular focus on long-standing validators. The initiative introduces a three-for-one replacement mechanism, whereby the introduction of each new validator will trigger the removal of three existing ones, subject to specific criteria.
The qualifying conditions for removal centre on validators who have maintained eligibility for Foundation delegation on the mainnet for a minimum of 18 months, whilst simultaneously holding stakes below 1,000 SOL from non-Foundation sources.
Industry observers note that this calculated pruning of the validator pool reflects Solana’s broader vision of fostering a self-sustaining network architecture. The measure aims to diminish the network’s dependence on Foundation-backed validation, whilst encouraging broader community engagement in network security.
