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The Ethereum network has reached a significant milestone, hitting 1 million validators. Terence Tsao, an Ethereum developer who goes by the name "Terence.eth" on X, took to social media to celebrate the milestone. 

"We reached 1 million validators," Terence wrote on X, attaching a screenshot. According to the screenshot, Ethereum active validators have reached 1,000,012, while pending validators total 14,379. 

This milestone is accompanied by an impressive figure of approximately 32 million Ethereum staked (32,000,026 ETH). This figure represents around 26% of Ethereum's total supply, demonstrating a substantial degree of participation in ETH staking. Staking is the act of depositing 32 ETH to activate validator software. 

Validators are critical to the Ethereum network, especially since its transition to a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism in September 2022. They are responsible for storing data, processing transactions and adding new blocks to the blockchain, a role previously filled by miners in the proof-of-work (PoW) model, thus keeping Ethereum secure and earning new ETH in the process.

Reaching one million validators is more than just a statistic; it represents the enormous amount of trust and resources that users are willing to commit to keeping the ETH network running.

The Shapella upgrade, which enabled staking withdrawals, has increased the number of validators on the Ethereum network.

Presently, the Ethereum network is gearing up for new upgrades: Electra is the consensus layer (CL) upgrade name for the next immediate hard fork scheduled on Ethereum. Deneb refers to the most recent hard fork activated on Ethereum. 

At the time of writing, ETH was down 5.139% in the last 24 hours to $3,123. According to crypto analyst Ali, the Ethereum price action is facing a brickwall resistance at $3,200, where 2.43 million addresses hold 5.14 million ETH.