If you’ve been a regular ShadeSwap user, you’ve probably noticed some swaps can be a bit heavy. Transactions can sometimes eat up a big chunk of gas, meaning fewer fit into a block, and that’s led to congestion, longer confirmation times, and a potentially frustrating experience for many of our users. We’ve heard the community loud and clear.
Well, today, we’re thrilled to share some major gas optimizations that will make Shade faster, smoother, and cheaper to use than ever before.
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What’s Changing?
At the heart of this upgrade are two major improvements:
Contract-Level Gas Efficiency
Smarter Front-End Gas Estimations
Problem: Too Much Gas, Not Enough Room
On Secret Network, each block (every 6 seconds) has a 4.5M gas limit. Many Shade transactions—especially complex swaps—used to take 2 to 3 million gas on their own. That meant only one or two of these complex transactions could fit per block. For the most active app on the network, that wasn’t sustainable. We had to overestimate gas usage on the front end just to make sure transactions didn’t fail.
Solution: Smarter Contracts & Smarter Estimates
Here’s what’s new:
Contract-Level Optimizations
We’ve reworked our core swap contracts to use 30–50% less gas across the board. That’s a massive win. For example:
Swapping USDC → SHD via SILK
Before: Reserved 2.2M gas, used ~1.5M
After: Uses just ~950K gas
Swapping SCRT → SHD via stkdSCRT
Before: Reserved 2.75M gas, used ~1.75M
After: Now just ~1.25M gas
That means more transactions fit into each block, more users can interact with Shade simultaneously, and everyone pays less to do so.
Front-End Gas Precision
Alongside this, we’ve updated the Shade front-end to predict gas more accurately, so we’re no longer over-reserving. This means:
Lower swap costs
More successful transactions
Better network throughput
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What This Means for Users
Your swaps will cost less gas (and less money).
Transactions will be faster and more reliable.
The Shade app can handle higher traffic with more ease.
Overall: a smoother, more scalable, and more enjoyable experience.
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A Big Step for Shade. A Bigger Step for Secret.
This isn’t just a quality-of-life upgrade—it’s an essential piece in scaling Shade to meet growing demand. As the most active dApp on Secret Network, we’re proud to lead the charge in improving the ecosystem for everyone.
We want to thank the community for your patience, your feedback, and your passion. Stay tuned, as our devs keep devving, there’s even more innovation around the corner.
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Use the app - app.shadeprotocol.io
Join the conversation on Telegram - https://t.me/ShadeProtocol
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Information provided in this post is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute formal investment advice. Please read the full disclaimer at shadeprotocol.io/disclaimer before relying on any information herein.
