Sei’s Bold Move: Mid-2026 Deadline to Go Fully EVM-Only
Sei Network just dropped a bombshell—by mid-2026, it's ditching everything else and going all-in on Ethereum Virtual Machine compatibility. No more multi-chain identity crisis. Just one unified, EVM-native future.
The EVM Takeover
Think of it as blockchain consolidation. Sei's betting big that developer mindshare and liquidity will continue flowing toward Ethereum's programming environment. The move essentially turns Sei into an EVM-optimized execution layer, hoping to capture the massive tooling and community built around Solidity.
Why the Hard Deadline?
Mid-2026 isn't arbitrary. It's a line in the sand. Teams building on Sei now have a clear, uncompromising timeline to migrate or adapt. The network is forcing a singular focus, betting that clarity and specialization will beat fragmentation in the long run. It's a high-stakes gamble on interoperability through standardization.
The Developer Play
For devs tired of cross-chain headaches, this simplifies the calculus. One chain, one familiar environment. Sei's essentially saying, 'Bring your Ethereum dApps here—we'll run them faster and cheaper.' It's a direct appeal to the largest pool of Web3 builders, with the promise of superior performance.
A Cynical Finance Angle
Let's be real—this is also a narrative play. In a market obsessed with 'Ethereum alignment,' Sei is buying the ultimate pedigree. It's the blockchain equivalent of a corporate rebrand before an IPO, hoping the EVM badge will attract both speculative capital and, you know, actual users. Sometimes, the best tech strategy is also the best marketing strategy.
Sei's putting all its chips on the Ethereum standard. By mid-2026, we'll know if betting the house on EVM was visionary focus or a dangerously narrow path.
Why is Sei Network making a transition?
The transition is driven by a proposal known as SIP-3 that was approved by the Sei community last May, which will deprecate the network’s CosmWasm smart contracts and native Cosmos transactions.
Sei Network aims to streamline its blockchain by removing hundreds of thousands of lines of code, clearing the path for performance improvements that SEI Labs claims will enable the network to process more than 200,000 transactions per second.
Jay Jog, co-founder of Sei Labs, the company behind the Sei Network, explained the rationale behind the MOVE on X, writing, “To make something faster, you either have to add power or reduce weight,” he wrote. “To make something a lot faster, you do both.”
Jog stated, “In simple terms, that’s what the SIP-3 upgrades will accomplish. They will dissolve Sei’s dual EVM + Cosmos architecture and make Sei an EVM-only chain. The code changes for implementing SIP-3, which the Sei ecosystem approved last May, are enormous. We are removing literally hundreds of thousands of lines of code.”
When will the Sei Network completely cut off Cosmos support?
The technical overhaul has immediate and serious implications for users holding Cosmos-native assets on Sei Network, especially those with USDC via Noble, known as USDC.n, as reported by Cryptopolitan.
There’s about $1.4 million worth of USDC.n currently circulating on Sei Network.
Sei Labs has asked the holders to convert these assets to native USDC before late March 2026 or risk losing access to their assets.
The transition is designed to unfold in three stages. Version 6.3 is expected to launch in January, and it will enable staking functionality through the EVM.
Version 6.4 is scheduled for February, and it will disable inbound IBC transfers to the platform. According to Sei Labs, “users will no longer be able to bridge Cosmos-specific tokens such as ATOM and USDC.n into Sei Network” when inbound transfer is disabled, as IBC is Cosmos’ native interoperability protocol.
A March release, version 6.5, will remove Sei’s native oracle from codebase. This will be replaced by established providers, including Chainlink, API3, and Pyth.
Users holding USDC.n can swap smaller amounts through decentralized exchanges such as DragonSwap or Symphony, though Sei Labs warns that slippage may vary depending on market conditions.
For larger conversions, a migration tool routes USDC.n from Noble through Polygon and back to Sei using Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol version 2. Those with USDC.n deposited in decentralized finance protocols have been advised to unwind their positions promptly.
Sei Labs launched its mainnet in 2023 and currently has a market capitalization of around $800 million.
In October 2025, Robinhood listed the SEI token, which helped to boost the reach of the asset to retail buyers. Earlier in 2025, Canary Capital filed for the first spot Sei exchange-traded fund with US regulators, though it has not been approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which insists on due diligence when it comes to cryptocurrency investment products.
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