Monero Activated CryptoNight-R at Block 1,788,000

Monero activated new consensus rules at block 1,788,000 on March 9, 2019, moving the network to protocol version 10 and replacing its proof-of-work function with CryptoNight-R. The maintained Monero Core repository ties that height and date to three principal changes: the new proof of work, a new block-weight algorithm and a more efficient RingCT transaction format.

This was not simply a wallet release or a proposal. Reaching the activation height changed the rules used by compatible nodes to decide which blocks were valid. Monero’s February announcement described the upgrade as mandatory and said users and service operators had to install version 0.14 software to remain on the upgraded network. Contemporaneous reporting on March 10 confirmed that the scheduled activation had completed.

Why CryptoNight-R mattered

The most consequential change was CryptoNight-R, the project’s third proof-of-work adjustment in less than a year. Monero’s stated objective was to make specialized application-specific integrated circuit miners ineffective and preserve competitive access for general-purpose hardware. The policy was controversial in principle: changing proof of work can displace installed mining equipment, require pool and miner updates, and temporarily disturb block production.

For Monero, the tradeoff was tied to censorship resistance. If mining became concentrated among a small number of specialized-hardware operators, those operators could gain greater influence over which transactions entered blocks. CryptoNight-R attempted to narrow the efficiency advantage of specialized machines. That was a design goal, not proof that mining was decentralized on March 9. The surviving event-day records do not provide a complete, independently audited census of hardware or mining-pool control.

The upgrade was described as non-contentious. In this context, “hard fork” meant a backward-incompatible change to consensus rules; it did not mean that holders automatically received a new asset. The pre-upgrade announcement said no chain split was expected because the project anticipated broad adoption of the new software. A next-day report described the upgrade as successful, but no complete node-adoption count survives in the sources reviewed here.

Transaction and capacity changes

Version 0.14 also changed how Monero handled block capacity and transactions. The release notes called the capacity mechanism a new block-weight algorithm. They also described a slightly more efficient RingCT format, a placeholder short payment ID intended to make transactions more uniform, and the disabling of obsolete long payment IDs unless a user deliberately enabled them.

Those changes addressed different parts of the system. RingCT obscured transaction amounts while preserving the ability of nodes to verify that value was not created improperly. More uniform payment-ID handling sought to reduce distinguishable transaction patterns. The new block-weight rules affected how the network responded to demand for block space. None of these changes established absolute privacy, unlimited throughput or freedom from implementation bugs.

The software record also shows the operational burden of the activation. Monero published the initial Boron Butterfly release on February 25 and a 0.14.0.2 point release on March 8. The latter contained wallet, synchronization, remote-procedure-call and fork-rule fixes. That sequencing shows that a consensus upgrade depended on release engineering and ecosystem coordination as much as on cryptographic design.

What the March 9 record establishes

The strongest conclusion is narrow: block 1,788,000 activated Monero version 10 on March 9, 2019, with CryptoNight-R, new block-weight rules and a revised RingCT format. The repository directly records the height, date and consensus changes; project announcements establish intent and required software; contemporaneous reporting confirms completion.

No price, return, trading-volume or market-capitalization claim is made because the protocol event does not require one. The records reviewed here do not prove the percentage of nodes upgraded, quantify hardware displaced, or independently measure the privacy and decentralization effects on March 9.

Later context

Monero’s maintained schedule records a second stage at block 1,788,720 on March 10, 2019, when version 11 prohibited the old RingCT transaction format. That later activation clarifies the staged transition but is not projected backward into the March 9 event.