Hedera Mainnet v0.79 Switches the Record Stream to a Block Stream

Hedera (HBAR) will upgrade its mainnet to version 0.79 on November 18, 2026, replacing its record stream with a single verifiable block stream. The same upgrade ran on the Hedera testnet on November 6. Standard interfaces for apps and wallets stay the same.

What the Block Stream Changes

The block stream replaces Hedera's record stream as the way network data is published. It combines the network's separate data streams into one stream that anyone can verify. Nodes sign the stream with threshold signature scheme signatures produced jointly across the network, as described in the Hedera testnet upgrade notice. Each block can then be checked against those joint signatures. The change mainly affects developers and infrastructure operators who consume network data directly.

What Does Not Change

Hedera says the upgrade does not affect its HAPI programming interface, the Hedera SDKs, the mirror node explorer, the mirror node REST API or the JSON-RPC relay, according to the v0.79 upgrade report. Wallets and apps built on these interfaces keep working without changes. For most users the upgrade is behind the scenes. It changes the data layer, not the consensus mechanism or the HBAR token.

A Data Layer Change for a Layer-1 Network

According to Coinranking's Hedera overview, Hedera is a public distributed ledger using hashgraph consensus instead of a traditional blockchain. Its mainnet launched in 2018, and the network is governed by a council of up to 39 member organizations. Its network upgrades roll out testnet first, then mainnet. The v0.79 release followed that pattern, running on testnet on November 6 before the mainnet date of November 18. Node operators and data providers who consume the record stream are the ones who need to update their pipelines before November 18. Traders can follow Hedera's live HBAR chart into the upgrade.