Lower demand for decentralized exchanges (DEXs) and NFT minting meant less competition for block space.
The "plummeting" fees in 2022 were driven by a combination of market cooling and technical evolution:
The 2022 "crypto winter" led to a massive drop in trading volume. Lower demand for decentralized exchanges (DEXs) and NFT
This prevented failed transactions and "bidding wars" from artificially inflating gas prices on the public mempool. Looking Ahead
While the Merge improved Ethereum's energy efficiency by 99%, fee reduction is being addressed through . This phase of the roadmap focuses on "sharding" and "data blobs" (EIP-4844), which specifically aim to make Layer 2 transactions even cheaper and increase overall network throughput. Looking Ahead While the Merge improved Ethereum's energy
Since the Merge didn't change the block size or the speed of block production significantly, it had no direct impact on gas prices. The Real Reasons Fees Plummeted
It did not significantly expand the network's capacity to handle more transactions per second. The Real Reasons Fees Plummeted It did not
The adoption of Flashbots helped move much of the "bidding" for transaction priority off-chain.