Smart wallet adoption surges with over 11,000 EIP-7702 authorizations on Ethereum within a week of Pectra upgrade

Within a week of Pectra's launch, over 11,000 EIP-7702 authorizations have occurred, indicating healthy uptake by wallets and dapps.

EIP-7702, part of Ethereum's Pectra upgrade, went live on mainnet around May 6, introducing a mechanism that allows standard Ethereum addresses controlled by private keys to temporarily delegate functionality to smart contract accounts.

This enables EOAs to access advanced features without requiring users to fully migrate to a new smart contract-based wallet. Smart wallets simplify complex blockchain interactions, making Ethereum more accessible to non-technical users.

After Pectra, regular EOA wallets can authorize a smart contract to act on their behalf by setting a "delegation indicator" that points to the authorized contract. When a transaction is sent to the EOA, the network executes the code of the delegated smart contract instead of the standard EOA behavior. The delegation is reversible, allowing users to retain control over their EOA and revoke the smart contract's authority if needed.

Smart accounts can be programmed with features like batched transactions, which means users can perform multiple actions at once — such as approving and swapping on a DEX — combined into a single transaction. Smart accounts can also implement advanced features such as multi-signature authentication, spending limits, or automated transaction scheduling. Users can transact without paying gas fees in the native token.

Following the implementation of this feature, Dune data from Entropy Advisors shows that WhiteBIT, a crypto platform, had a delegate contract that received 5,300 authorizations, nearly half of the total.

WhiteBIT likely uses this delegate contract to manage user interactions on-chain, possibly for features like batch transactions, gas sponsorship, or streamlined user onboarding.

OKX's wallet leads among wallets with over 3,100 authorizations, significantly outpacing competitors. MetaMask, the most popular crypto wallet, has recorded about 1,300 delegations but holds more ETH in its delegate contracts than OKX, suggesting higher-value transactions or larger user balances.

Pectra includes multiple Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs), with EIP-7702 being a standout for its focus on user-facing improvements. Beyond EIP-7702, Pectra likely includes upgrades to Ethereum validator operations and Layer 2 blob scaling.