Ethereum Set to Deploy ERC-8004 Standard, Unlocking Global AI Agent Interoperability

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Ethereum has been making significant strides in the development of its newest smart contract standard designed for trustless artificial intelligence (AI) agent communication.

ERC-8004 is set to be deployed on mainnet this week, potentially on Thursday, according to lead developer Marco De Rossi, Head of AI at MetaMask.

Marco De Rossi announced the impending deployment of ERC-8004 during a recent discussion in a Telegram channel dedicated to developers of the protocol. The official Ethereum X account followed up with confirmation that the protocol would go live on mainnet “soon.”

ERC-8004 is going live on mainnet soon.

By enabling discovery and portable reputation, ERC-8004 allows AI agents to interact across organizations ensuring credibility travels everywhere.

This unlocks a global market where AI services can interoperate without gatekeepers. https://t.co/Yrl0rvnSxj
— Ethereum (@ethereum) January 27, 2026

What ERC-8004 Is Designed to Solve

Developed by the team at MetaMask, ERC-8004 serves as a standard way for registering and validating AI agents within Ethereum’s ecosystem, permitting these agents to communicate across various platforms without the need for centralized gatekeepers. It addresses two key challenges: discovering AI agents and assessing their reliability.

The development of ERC-8004 effectively complements existing protocols like MCP (Model Context Protocol) and Agent2Agent, which manage agent communication and skills advertisement, but do not offer solutions for discovery or trust establishment.

The new standard ensures credibility can be transferred everywhere AI agents interact, which is crucial to fostering an open, cross-organizational agent economy on blockchain.

“To foster an open, cross-organizational agent economy, we need mechanisms for discovering and trusting agents in untrusted settings,” De Rossi clarified during the discussion on Monday.

The introduction of ERC-8004 unlocks a global market for AI services to interoperate without the intervention of gatekeepers—an essential step towards an AI economy built on Ethereum.

According to the official Ethereum account on X, this development solidifies Ethereum as the platform that not only secures but also settles AI-to-AI interactions.

Potential Support on Ethereum Layer-2 Base

Furthermore, the Ethereum layer-2 Base may support the standard’s implementation in addition to mainnet.

Base leverages x402—an open payment protocol developed by Coinbase and introduced in May 2025—for instant, automatic stablecoin payments over HTTP that can directly facilitate autonomous transactions between AI agents.

While no definitive timeline has been given for the deployment on Ethereum layer-2 Base, the launch of ERC-8004 represents a major leap in fostering an open ecosystem free from gatekeepers and paves the way for interoperable AI services on the blockchain.

Author

Steven Walgenbach

Steven's passion for cryptocurrency and blockchain technology began in 2014, inspiring him to immerse himself in the field. He notably secured a top 5 world ranking in robotics. While he initially pursued a computer science degree at the University of Texas at Arlington, he chose to pause his studies after two semesters to take a more hands-on approach in advancing cryptocurrency technology. During this period, he actively worked on multiple patents related to cryptocurrency and blockchain. Additionally, Steven has explored various areas of the financial sector, including banking and financial markets, developing prototypes such as fully autonomous trading bots and intuitive interfaces that streamline blockchain integration, among other innovations.

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