ENS seeks DAO approval to activate upgraded Ethereum naming system

What happened

Ethereum Name Service (ENS) is seeking approval from its decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) to activate an upgraded naming protocol on the Ethereum mainnet. If approved, the upgrade would freeze new registrations on the original ENS registrar while allowing existing domain holders to continue renewing their names.

The upgrade introduces a redesigned registry architecture with more flexible domain management and permissions. After the activation, ENS Labs plans to transfer its remaining administrative control over the upgraded contracts to the DAO.

New .eth registrations would move to the upgraded system once domain records have been synchronized. Johnson warned that new registrations would be temporarily unavailable on either version for several hours during the transition.

ENS founder Nick Johnson submitted an executable draft proposal to activate ENSv2, the next version of the protocol. The activation proposal remains in draft stage and must advance to an onchain DAO vote before implementation.