Polygon Labs has announced a significant step forward in its network’s evolution, announcing that it will be changing its native token from MATIC to POL. The transition will take place gradually, starting on September 4th, when POL will become the native staking and gas token for the Polygon PoS network.
Migration process from MATIC to POL
Polygon emphasizes that the community-driven migration from MATIC to POL will be key to the integrated blockchain network, known as AggLayer. The decision to “upgrade” the native token was the result of extensive discussions and proposals that were initiated by PIP-17 in 2023. Polygon declares that this is a step in line with their vision for the future of the network.
Why POL?
Polygon Labs argues that the move to POL is intended to increase the utility of the native token and make it a foundation for the growing Polygon ecosystem. POL is intended to support the growth and security of the network while enabling cross-chain services.
While the transition to POL will have an immediate impact on the Polygon PoS network, the long-term plan is to expand POL’s role on Polygon’s staking hub, which is set to launch in 2025. POL will play a key role in block generation, participation in DACs (data accessibility committees), and the generation of zero-knowledge proofs.
POL implementation
The first step towards achieving this community-driven vision was taken in October last year when ERC-20 contracts for POL were launched on Ethereum. Polygon also confirmed that a successful migration was conducted on the testnet in July 2024. As part of the PIP-42 consensus, validators on the Polygon PoS network will be required to stake POL to earn protocol rewards and transaction fees in the token.
Polygon Labs encourages its users, developers, and community members to review the available information and take the necessary steps to ensure a smooth transition into the upcoming POL era.
Impact on users
Polygon Labs has confirmed that the upgrade will impact MATIC holders and various network users in different ways. MATIC holders on the Polygon PoS chain will benefit from automatic conversion to POL, while MATIC holders on Ethereum, Polygon zkEVM, or centralized exchanges will need to upgrade their tokens through a few outlined steps.
Polygon notes that there is no firm timeline for this conversion yet. However, it is reminding MATIC holders on Polygon PoS to update the RPC settings in their wallets, otherwise their wallets will continue to display MATIC instead of POL as the native token symbol.
Polygon noted that there is currently no way to swap MATIC to POL on the Polygon chain, but MATIC holders on self-custodial wallets can now swap MATIC to Ethereum for POL using dApps like ParaSwap or KyberSwap.
Polygon also assured that most of the major exchanges will likely roll out the update automatically for their users.