Bitcoin Core v30 Goes Live Despite OP_RETURN Debate
Bitcoin Core model 30.0 is now accessible, marking the mission’s first main launch since v29 and shutting the e book on legacy branches 27.x and older, which are actually designated “End of Life.” The maintainers’ launch notes state plainly: “With the discharge of this new main model, variations 27.x and older are at ‘End of Life’ and can not obtain updates.” The new binaries and full notes are reside on the mission website, with the group additionally posting a short launch affirmation on X.
Bitcoin Core V30 Is Here
The most disputed change in v30 is a coverage replace round OP_RETURN—the script path used for provably unspendable outputs that may carry arbitrary knowledge. Bitcoin Core has raised the default -datacarriersize restrict to 100,000 bytes and now permits a number of data-carrier (OP_RETURN) outputs in a single transaction for relay and mining. Crucially, node operators can nonetheless restore the earlier conduct: “It could be overridden with -datacarriersize=83 to revert to the restrict enforced in earlier variations.” The combination dimension restrict applies throughout all OP_RETURN outputs in a transaction.
That default improve—functionally “uncapping” knowledge service dimension as a result of the transaction-size ceiling shall be encountered first—has kicked off a broader argument about what sorts of exercise Bitcoin’s coverage layer ought to favor or discourage. Developers and node operators who again the change body it as impartial plumbing that preserves operator selection; critics warn it invites more non-monetary inscriptions and potential spam, elevating storage and validation burdens for the common node.
Beyond OP_RETURN, v30 delivers a protracted checklist of community, pockets, and tooling updates. The P2P layer improves bundle relay in order that widespread topologies like grandparent-parent-child or multi-parent-one-child can propagate extra reliably when just one ancestor wants price bumping. The transaction orphanage introduces stronger DoS limits primarily based on whole entries and weight throughout friends, changing the now-retired -maxorphantx knob.
Miners achieve an experimental IPC mining interface accessible by a brand new umbrella bitcoin command that additionally gives comfort aliases—“bitcoin node,” “bitcoin gui,” and “bitcoin rpc”—with out deprecating present binaries. External signing on Windows is re-enabled, and the coinstats index has been reworked to keep away from an overflow bug seen on default Signet, requiring a one-time resync of that index.
Fee-policy defaults additionally shift. The minimal block feerate setting (-blockmintxfee) now defaults to 0.001 sat/vB, whereas each the minimal relay and incremental relay feerates default to 0.1 sat/vB. The notes stress that except these decrease defaults are broadly adopted, propagation and affirmation aren’t assured; pockets feerates themselves are unchanged with out express configuration.
The OP_RETURN coverage change has shortly spilled past developer channels into Bitcoin’s public discourse, with long-time contributors and publication editors lining up on either side. While Bitcoin Core 30.0’s bigger data-carrier default and allowance for a number of OP_RETURN outputs are seen by proponents as coverage impartial and adjustable on the node degree; detractors see a vector for abuse that blurs the community’s financial focus which might even spark a hard fork.
At press time, BTC traded at $114,455.
