Starknet's Extended Downtime Raises Questions About Layer-2 Stability

The Ethereum scaling solution Starknet experienced its second significant network interruption in recent months, with the layer-2 blockchain going offline for over four hours due to a proving mechanism malfunction.

What Triggered the Outage

Early Monday morning, validators on the Starknet network detected irregularities in block validation processes. The technical team identified a proving error affecting transaction processing on the chain. In response, the network’s sequencing—the mechanism responsible for transaction ordering and block creation—was temporarily suspended to prevent potential state inconsistencies.

“We halted block production operations to ensure the integrity of the chain while our engineering team conducted comprehensive verification,” the Starknet team communicated to the community during the incident.

Recovery Timeline

The incident began before 5:00 AM ET and stretched beyond 9:00 AM ET. During this window, the development team:

• Isolated the root cause of the proving error
• Performed extensive validation testing
• Analyzed downstream system impacts
• Reverted the chain to block 5187263
• Gradually restored normal operations

By mid-morning, Starknet announced full operational status had been restored. However, the team noted that transactions submitted during a brief 18-minute window may not have been properly recorded on-chain.

A Pattern Emerging

This marks the second major downtime event for the layer-2 network within months. Following September’s Grinta upgrade, Starknet experienced over five hours of disruption that required multiple chain reorganizations, affecting approximately 80 minutes worth of transaction data. These recurring incidents highlight challenges in maintaining reliable infrastructure for blockchain scaling solutions.

Market Response and Current Status

Despite the operational disruption, STRK token holders showed measured response to the event. The native token declined 1.56% over the 24-hour period following the incident, trading near $0.08, though it remains down approximately 8.76% across the weekly timeframe. Ethereum (ETH), the underlying Layer-2 protocol, showed resilience with marginal daily movement to $3.11K, posting a modest 1.43% decline for the week.

The incident underscores the technical complexities of operating advanced scaling solutions, even as Starknet continues expanding its capabilities—the platform recently integrated Bitcoin staking functionality alongside its Ethereum scaling services.

What’s Next

Starknet’s team committed to publishing a comprehensive incident retrospective detailing the complete timeline, technical root causes, and preventative measures to minimize recurrence risks. The community awaits these findings as confidence in layer-2 infrastructure stability remains a critical consideration for users and developers evaluating scaling solutions.