The Ethereum Pectra upgrade introduced a significant upgrade in account abstraction accessibility, with multiple wallets already implementing the change.
Pectra introduced Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 7702, a change that Ivo Georgiev, founder and CEO of self-custodial smart wallet Ambire, described as “the single greatest UX upgrade to Ethereum so far.” Ambire is among the wallet providers that have already rolled out support for the new features since Pectra went live yesterday.
Ambire’s announcement shared with Cointelegraph explains that EIP-7702 brings smart account functionality to existing user accounts, letting them temporarily act as smart contracts. This results in the advantages of account abstraction being accessible without creating new dedicated onchain addresses, rendering the transition of existing addresses possible.
Another wallet that launched new features was Trust Wallet, allowing users to pay gas (transaction fees) in tokens such as stablecoins instead of Ether (ETH). The new wallets are also programmable and still ensure self-custody.
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Ambire’s take on the update
According to an Ambire announcement shared with Cointelegraph, key features users can now enjoy without switching accounts include a crosschain by default architecture, with one dashboard showing balances on all chains. One wallet can be used across all blockchains, gas fees are abstracted and the system uses a decentralized finance (DeFi) aggregator Li.Fi for its swap and bridging needs.
The company also promises transaction simulation across all supported chains, scam application detection and minimal token approvals. This statement follows some developers raising concerns that EIP-7702 provided a new avenue for phishing campaigns to empty entire wallets at once.
Ambire also claimed that it does not rely on third-party services, allowing for better privacy features and higher reliability (no third party whose outage will result in a wallet outage). The firm also said that the new accounts are more accessible to AI agents:
“Account programmability enables AI agents to act upon your account in the future to enhance your portfolio yield, save your DeFi positions, claim airdrops automatically and more.”
Georgiev claimed that Ambire’s offering is the first on the market since Trust Wallet announced that it will be “live soon.” Ambire’s updated system was deployed minutes after the update during a live X conference.
Related: How smart accounts and account abstraction can unlock Ethereum’s full utility
Trust Wallet’s new systems
Trust Wallet’s announcement describes the upgrade as the biggest since Ethereum’s full transition to proof-of-stake in the “merge” event. The firm’s CEO, Eowyn Chen, said:
“EIP-7702 changes the game.”
Trust Wallet promises its users will be able to pay fees in tokens that are not Ether and bundle multiple actions in one transaction, for instance, approving, swapping and signing a transaction all at once. The new wallet will also support sponsored transactions where third parties can cover gas fees to onboard new users and automated actions such as subscriptions, dollar-cost averaging and more.
All those features will become available to existing users without re-creating new accounts with new seed phrases. Like Ambire, Trust Wallet also developed its account abstraction infrastructure in-house, minimizing data sharing and reliance on third parties.
“Our vision is to evolve wallets from static key holders into intelligent, user-friendly agents,” Chen said.
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