Polkadot Governance Approves First Validator Cut to 500

Polkadot governance approved cutting the network’s active validator set from 600 to 500, a change that will reshape staking elections after enactment and may affect which nominators qualify for rewards.

Referendum 1966 passed Sunday, Nov. 8, with 99.9% approval. At 12:49 a.m. ET (5:49 UTC), when the referendum was confirmed, about 48.14 million Polkadot (DOT) votes supported the change and 36,388.1 DOT opposed it.

The approved call will take effect at Relay Chain block 33,814,400. The 500-validator limit applies in the first era after enactment. Polkadot updates its active validator elections each era, which lasts roughly 24 hours. If none of a nominator’s selected validators enters the active set, the nominator may miss staking rewards for that era. The exact first election using the smaller set depends on when the next election runs after enactment.

The referendum also reduces the Dynamic Allocation Pool’s validator-incentive budget in proportion to the smaller set and includes configuration changes for the Relay Chain and Coretime chain.

The move is the first stage of a broader proposal to reduce the active validator set to 500, then 400 and 320 over three weeks. The proposal also ties the reductions to validator operators running collators for Asset Hub and People Chain and providing light-node and RPC services for Polkadot App. The referendum authorizes the 500-validator limit, while the proposed cuts to 400 and 320 still need approval.