ETHTaipei

ETHTaipei is a community-driven annual Ethereum developer conference in Taiwan that connects the Taiwan and wider Asian blockchain community with international protocol teams for technical exchange. It was first held in Taiwan in 2023, and its fourth edition, ETHTaipei 2026, was held on September 13–14, 2026, at POPOP Taipei, the venue also known as the Nangang Bottle Cap Factory, in Taipei's Nangang District.^[1]​^[2]​^[3]​

Since its inaugural edition in 2023, ETHTaipei reports that it has gathered more than 3,000 participants, 169 speakers, and 129 talks, alongside over 70 side events; the organizers present these as the conference's own cumulative figures.^[5]​^[6]​

Overview and Mission

ETHTaipei focuses on bringing builders of the Ethereum ecosystem together for technical discussion. ETHTaipei is organized by a volunteer community organizing team operating under the ETHTaipei umbrella and run in collaboration with local Ethereum and blockchain communities in Taipei.^[7][13] The organizers state that the event is intended to help the community "learn and make progress in the space to build a better future for Web3," and that it gives Taiwanese teams an opportunity to connect internationally and gain exposure while positioning Taiwan as a key hub for blockchain technology in Asia.^[3][6] The event's descriptive tagline is "where Builders, Dreamers, and Innovators connect," and the industries it associates itself with are blockchain, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), and decentralized finance (DeFi).^[7][3]

History

2023 edition

The inaugural ETHTaipei conference and hackathon took place at POPOP Taipei in April 2023, organized as a five-day event with a three-day hackathon followed by a two-day conference focused on Ethereum, zero-knowledge proofs, DeFi, and security topics.^[10] The event was coordinated by a volunteer organizing committee drawn from Taiwan's blockchain community.^[13] On the first conference day, April 24, 2023, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin delivered the opening keynote by livestream, presenting his outlook on Ethereum and blockchain and engaging in a remote question-and-answer session with attendees.^[10] The inaugural edition also emphasized hackathons, workshops, and collaboration among developers, in line with the organizers' positioning of Taiwan as an important hub for blockchain technology.^[3]

2024 edition

ETHTaipei 2024 continued the annual format at POPOP Taipei, bringing together Ethereum-focused teams from around the world and highlighting Taiwan as a significant regional hub for the Ethereum ecosystem.^[11] The 2024 edition maintained a focus on Ethereum technology, with hackathons, workshops, and side events that facilitated technical exchange and collaboration between international protocol teams and Taiwan's developer community.^[11]

2025 edition

ETHTaipei 2025 followed the same annual format at POPOP Taipei, again convening Ethereum-focused teams internationally and emphasizing Taiwan's role in the regional Ethereum developer ecosystem.^[12] Its program similarly centered on Ethereum technology through hackathons, workshops, and side events aimed at technical exchange between international protocol teams and local developers.^[12]

ETHTaipei 2026

ETHTaipei 2026, the fourth edition, introduced a two-day curated format for the first time in the conference's history, splitting the program into a developer-facing day and an institution-facing day.^[1][5] A member of the organizing team, referred to as Martinet, summarized the theme by stating: "Cryptographic technology and the real world are converging, and it is the research and engineering behind it that makes this possible. This is the core of ETHTaipei 2026."^[6][8]

The conference was structured as two days of talks and discussions with Ethereum researchers, builders, and industry leaders.^[1]

Cryptonative Day

The first day, September 13, was designated Cryptonative Day and was aimed at Ethereum developers and the technical community. Its focus areas included protocols and core development, Layer 2 scaling, zero-knowledge proofs and privacy, wallets and account abstraction, DeFi and on-chain finance, consumer and social applications, security, and developer tools and infrastructure.^[5][4] Cryptonative Day featured Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin as the keynote speaker.^[8][9]

Institution Day

The second day, September 14, was designated Institution Day and was held for the first time in ETHTaipei's history in 2026. It was tailored for banks, financial institutions, and enterprise teams, and included sessions, panels, and closed-door discussions.^[5][7] The day's topics covered institutional-grade wallets and digital asset custody, digital asset and smart contract security, stablecoin risk management, real-world assets (RWA) and the tokenization of U.S. stocks, AI agent-driven "machine finance," and blockchain selection for financial institutions, alongside broader themes of compliance, adoption, and collaboration between institutions and Ethereum builders.^[1][4] Institution Day featured Lin Chih-Chen (Lin Zhichen), CEO of Taiwan Mobile, as the keynote speaker.^[8][9] Press coverage has framed the new institutional finance track as reflecting traditional finance's growing exploration of DeFi, RWA tokenization, and digital-asset custody.^[2]