Vitalik Buterin: Merge May Not Be Happening Today But It's Still An Important Day

Ethereum ETH/USD creator Vitalik Buterin clarified that the Merge event is still a few days away — but Tuesday's networks upgrade is still significant for the blockchain.

What Happened: Buterin took to Twitter to state that although the Bellatrix hard fork would go live on Tuesday, the actual Merge will take place only around Sept. 13 and Sept .15.

The merge is still expected to happen around Sep 13-15. What's happening today is the Bellatrix hard fork, which *prepares* the chain for the merge. Still important though - make sure to update your clients!

— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) September 6, 2022

The Bellatrix hard fork prepares the chain for the Merge, the Ethereum co-founder said, urging network participants to update their clients so that the event can go ahead as planned.  

Last month, the Ethereum Foundation said that today’s network upgrade would set the Merge in motion after it hits an epoch of 144896 on the Beacon Chain at around 11:34:47 AM UTC on Sept 6.

Only ~9 more days until the #Ethereum Merge goes live  pic.twitter.com/aiG94hju1C

— Crypto-Gucci.eth ᵍᵐ (@CryptoGucci) September 5, 2022

According to data from Ethernodes, around 72% of ETH nodes have already updated their nodes to be ready for the Merge.

See Also: HOW TO STAKE ETHEREUM

Price Action: At the time of writing, ETH was trading at $1,646, up 4.37% in the last 24 hours as per data from Benzinga Pro.