The 4th ETHShanghai Conference will be grandly held in Shanghai from October 18 to 22, 2025. This conference, themed "Expanding Ethereum, Shaping an Open Future," is led by the Chinese-speaking builder community ETHPanda, in collaboration with Wanxiang Blockchain Lab, PANews, and TinTinLand.
As Asia’s top Ethereum event, this gathering brought together key figures such as Vitalik Buterin, Hsiao-Wei Wang, and Tomasz Stańczak, attracting hundreds of developers and project teams from around the world.
01 Event Overview: Shanghai Becomes the Global Focus of Web3 Again
ETHShanghai 2025 will be held concurrently in the same city as the Wanxiang Blockchain Global Summit, aiming to create a global Web3 The focus of the world.
The entire event is centered around a five-day hackathon and summit, bringing together the most active developers and researchers in the Asia-Pacific region to translate ideas from code to user practice.
This grand event is not only an important celebration after the tenth anniversary of Ethereum, but also the starting point for the next phase of ecosystem expansion.
A lineup of heavyweight guests
The guest lineup for this conference is luxurious, including Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, Chairman of Wanxiang Holdings Xiao Feng, and co-executive directors of the Ethereum Foundation Hsiao-Wei Wang and Tomasz Stańczak.
There are also more than 40 industry leaders, including Du Yu, General Manager of Wanxiang Blockchain Lab, Bruce, co-founder of ETHPanda, and Bi Tongtong, co-founder of PANONY & PANews.
02 Hackathon: 72-hour coding sprint, igniting the next decade of Ethereum
As the technical core and innovation engine of the conference, the 72-hour offline hackathon held from October 18 to 21 has become the stage for igniting the innovation wave of Ethereum’s next decade.
Scale and Prize of the Competition
This event selected about 100 top developers from over 500 applications worldwide, incubating 30 to 40 cutting-edge projects on site.
The winning projects will share a total prize pool of up to $15,000, and the champion teams of each track will have the opportunity to showcase their results on the main summit stage to top investment institutions.
Three major cutting-edge tracks
The hackathon revolves around three major cutting-edge tracks:
AI × ETH: Following the establishment of the dAI team by the Ethereum Foundation, we explore the deep integration of AI and Ethereum. We encourage innovation in areas such as smart contract automation, on-chain governance agents, and AI-driven risk control.
DeFi × Infra: In the context of the evolution of RWA and modular technology, promote the reconstruction of financial infrastructure to build a safer, smarter, and more scalable financial network.
Public Goods × Open Source Construction: Strengthen the ecological foundation, support the development of underlying infrastructure and collaborative tools, and promote the continuous development of open finance and open society.
03 Main Summit: The Ultimate Stage for Technological Consensus and Ideological Collision
The ETHShanghai main summit on October 22 brought together over 40 industry leaders from around the world to engage in in-depth discussions on core topics such as Ethereum scaling, modular ecosystems, developer growth, and long-term security.
Overview of Exciting Agenda
The conference was officially opened with a speech by Xiao Feng, Vice Chairman of Wanxiang Holdings and Chairman of Wanxiang Blockchain.
Subsequently, Vitalik Buterin delivered a keynote speech online, sharing his latest thoughts on the future roadmap of Ethereum, the integration of AI and blockchain, and the evolution of the DeFi ecosystem.
Another highly anticipated keynote speech comes from Hsiao-Wei Wang, the new co-executive director of the Ethereum Foundation. She is known for her strong technical background and rich community experience, having led the development of sharding and the beacon chain, making significant contributions to the evolution of the protocol layer.
Afterward, ETHPanda co-founder Bruce Xu hosted a fireside chat with Tomasz Stańczak. Tomasz, as the founder of Nethermind and co-executive director of the Ethereum Foundation, has long been committed to execution layer optimization and modular architecture promotion.
The summit also featured multiple roundtable discussions covering various hot topics such as L2 scaling, the integration of TradFi and Web3, AI applications, and community contributions.
04 Youth Voyage Program: Cultivating the Developer Ecosystem for Asian Youth
As a highlight of the conference, the "Youth Voyage Program" has successfully concluded in the earlier stages. This program aims to lower the barriers for outstanding young developers in Asia to participate in top Web3 events through travel sponsorship, community support, and resource connections.
Since its launch, the plan has received unprecedented responses, with the organizers receiving 154 highly competitive applications. After strict selection, more than 30 outstanding young developers, including Clare Yang, Blue, Coooder, and karl4C, emerged.
These "Voyagers" not only received a travel subsidy of up to 200 USDT but also participated in the hackathon throughout, competing alongside top developers from around the world and gaining valuable opportunities such as entry into the community talent pool and project recommendations.
05 Gate Perspective: Market Dynamics and Ecological Progress During the Same Period
During the ETHShanghai conference, the cryptocurrency market experienced significant fluctuations, while Gate and its ecosystem also welcomed important developments.
The differentiation between mainstream coins and AI tokens is obvious.
According to data from Gate Research Institute on October 22, the cryptocurrency market is experiencing fluctuations and corrections, with mainstream coins generally under pressure.
BTC dropped 0.88%, maintaining a fluctuation in the key support range; ETH dropped 1.63%, showing a weak trend. However, AI concept tokens have risen against the trend, displaying significant market differentiation:
- BLUAI (Bluwhale AI) surged 295.40%, driven by its listing on Gate and the "AI × Sui" narrative;
- COAI (ChainOpera AI) increased by 39.45%, focusing on the AI Agent ecosystem.
- LIGHT (Bitlight Labs) rose 26.72%, boosted by the white paper and the enthusiasm surrounding the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Decentralized derivatives market breakthrough
According to on-chain data, the Gate decentralized perpetual contract platform Gate Perp DEX has surpassed a cumulative trading volume of 1 billion USD, showing a strong growth trend in user scale and market activity.
This milestone reflects the increasing acceptance of users towards decentralized trading experiences, and it also indicates that Gate’s strategy in laying out the derivatives market is gradually showing results.
Leverage liquidation and market structure stabilization
According to Coinglass data, Bitcoin’s Open Interest has dropped by about 30% in the past week, indicating that the market has undergone a significant deleveraging.
High leveraged funds were forced to close positions, causing the overheated bullish leverage in the market to cool rapidly. The funding rate also dropped back to near neutral levels, indicating a rebalancing of long and short forces.
06 Ecosystem Co-construction: The lineup of sponsors demonstrates industry support
The successful hosting of ETHShanghai 2025 relies on the strong support of numerous industry partners. The lineup of sponsors for the conference covers multiple key areas of the Ethereum ecosystem:
Diamond Sponsorship: ESP, BitSeek
Platinum Sponsorship: HashKey Chain
Gold Sponsors: GCC, PicWe, SYNBO Protocol, Liu Bing (Investor of Nantang DAO), Injective
Hackathon / Voyage Program Sponsors: Nora, BGA (Blockchain for Good Alliance), Chainlink, Licredity
The participation of these sponsors not only provided support for the event but also reflected the industry’s strong confidence in the long-term development of the Ethereum ecosystem.
Future Prospects
ETHShanghai 2025 has concluded, but the evolution of Ethereum continues. From the brand new narrative of dAI to the technical leadership of key figures such as Vitalik, Hsiao-Wei Wang, and Tomasz, and the dozens of innovative projects incubated on-site, Shanghai has once again proven its important position on the global Web3 innovation map.
With the advancement of technology upgrades such as Pectra and Fusaka, and the continuous influx of institutional funds like ETFs and DATs, Ethereum is undergoing a comprehensive transformation from its technical core to its ecological extension.
