Monad Upgrade Slashes Storage Read Gas Fees by 98%

Monad, the popular EVM compatible blockchain, has successfully activated its MonadTen upgrade on mainnet. Launched on September 2, this update introduces the MIP 8 specification, which completely changes how the network charges smart contracts for reading data storage.

Under the new rules, Monad groups storage into pages of 128 consecutive slots. While the first read on a new page still costs 8,100 gas, any subsequent reads on that same page cost just 100 gas. Previously, reading two adjacent slots cost 8,100 gas each, meaning developers can now see gas savings of up to 98% for clustered data.

This upgrade naturally benefits standard Solidity smart contract layouts. Sequential state variables, struct fields, and array elements are usually stored in consecutive slots, meaning they will automatically get this discount. Developers now have a strong incentive to organize their smart contract data so that things read together are stored close together.

While this is great news for efficiency, developers using tools that build gas estimates, access lists, or storage proofs will need to update their setups. Contracts that hardcode storage gas costs could also face compatibility issues, so builders should check their code to ensure everything runs smoothly.