Ethereum’s gas woes get a fix as MetaMask launches ‘Gas Station’

For years, Ethereum users have struggled with failed transactions due to insufficient gas fees. MetaMask’s new Gas Station eliminates this hassle by covering fees within the swap process itself.

On Feb. 5, MetaMask introduced “Gas Station,” a new feature aimed at addressing one of the most frustrating roadblocks in the Ethereum (ETH) ecosystem—insufficient gas fees preventing transactions from going through.

Since network fees must be paid in ETH, users without a sufficient balance often find themselves stuck, forced to go through the time-consuming process of purchasing ETH from an exchange and transferring it to their wallet before they can proceed.

With its new Gas Station feature, users can now complete token swaps without needing to maintain a separate ETH balance for gas. Instead, transaction fees are included directly in the swap quote, eliminating the need for last-minute ETH top-ups and making the process smoother.

The feature is currently live on the MetaMask browser extension for Ethereum’s mainnet, with a mobile rollout planned soon.

It supports swaps involving a range of assets, including Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), Dai (DAI), ETH, Wrapped Ethereum (wETH), Wrapped Bitcoin (wBTC), Wrapped Staked Ethereum (wstETH), and Wrapped Solana (wSOL). Users simply need to ensure that their swap value is sufficient to cover the gas fees.

MetaMask’s update comes at a time when Ethereum itself is undergoing a major change. Validators recently approved an increase in the network’s gas limit, raising it from 30 million to a planned maximum of 36 million gas units.

The gas limit determines the amount of computational work that can be processed in a single block, effectively setting the number of transactions that can be included.

When the limit is too low and network demand is high, fees surge as users compete for block space. Increasing the gas limit allows more transactions to fit into each block, improving network efficiency and easing congestion.

According to on-chain data, the average gas limit has already climbed to 35.5 million units as of Feb. 5. The last time Ethereum made such a change was in 2021, when it doubled the gas limit from 15 million to 30 million.

However, this latest increase is particularly notable as the first since Ethereum’s transition to proof-of-stake, marking a big step in the network’s post-Merge evolution.