About Core-Geth
Where Core-Geth came from, and who carries it
Core-Geth has outlived every organization that funded it before the Ethereum Classic DAO. This page is the lineage: the code it descends from, the organizations that led and funded the work, and the move into the ethereumclassic GitHub organization.
The Core-Geth code
Core-Geth's code lineage
Core-Geth holds Ethereum Classic's chain rules as configuration rather than as code branches, which is why one binary serves several networks: adding a network means writing a chain configuration, not forking the client. It inherited that design from multi-geth, the client it was forked from in 2020.
December 2013
go-ethereum
The Go implementation of the Ethereum protocol, and the code every client in this lineage descends from. Core-Geth's Go module path is still
ethereum/go-ethereumgithub.com/ethereum/go-ethereum, and every internal import uses it: deliberate downstream compatibility rather than a leftover.March 2018
multi-geth
Forked go-ethereum to serve several networks from one client, holding chain rules as configuration rather than as code branches. Sorpaas led its development from the start.
multi-geth2020
Core-Geth
Forked from multi-geth and kept its configuration model, which is what the client still runs on today. One binary serves Ethereum Classic, Mordor, MintMe and private chains.
ethereumclassic/core-geth
The organizations behind Core-Geth
Who led the work, and who paid for it
Whether this client is maintained has always depended on an organization choosing to pay for it, and each one handed the work on as it left. Ethereum Classic's core developers maintain it today, in the ethereumclassic organization, with the Ethereum Classic DAO as the legal entity behind them and the funder of last resort.
2014 to 2016
Ethereum Foundation
Built and maintained go-ethereum, the client both chains ran until Ethereum Classic began at the 2016 split. Everything after that split is Ethereum Classic's own line.
ethereum/go-ethereum2016 to 2018
ETCDEV
Supported Ethereum Classic's first clients, Classic Geth among them, in the legacy
ethereumproject/go-ethereumethereumprojectGitHub organization, from the Gas Reprice upgrade in October 2016 to Defuse Difficulty Bomb in May 2018. Left the ecosystem in 2018.2018 to 2020
Sorpaas
Led multi-geth's development from its start until 2020, and left the ecosystem then. Core-Geth was forked from multi-geth that year.
multi-geth/multi-geth2019 to 2021
ETC Labs
Led development from the Atlantis upgrade in 2019 to Magneto in 2021, through the fork and rebrand of multi-geth to Core-Geth, publishing as ETC Labs and ETC Core. Left the Ethereum Classic ecosystem in 2021, and
etclabscore/core-gethetclabscore/core-gethpassed to the ETC Cooperative, which owns it today.2022 to 2024
ETC Cooperative
Funded and maintained Core-Geth from January 2022, at
ethereumclassic/core-gethetclabscore/core-geth, and maintained Ethereum Classic's other public goods: the peer discovery lists, the bootnodes and the public JSON-RPC endpoints. It entered maintenance mode at the end of 2024 and began transferring those public goods to theethereumclassicGitHub organization. It stopped developing Core-Geth in 2025 and wound down its team, and its board has communicated that it is scheduled to dissolve by the end of 2026, with the public goods continuing in theethereumclassicorganization.2024 onward
The Ethereum Classic GitHub organization
Created in July 2016, five days before the chain split, and the home of Ethereum Classic's public goods ever since: the ECIPs, the website, the peer discovery lists, and Core-Geth from December 2024. Every repository in it has more than one admin and more than one maintainer, so no single person or employer controls any of them.
github.com/ethereumclassic2025
Ethereum Classic DAO
A Wyoming DAO LLC, launched in May 2025, and the legal entity behind Ethereum Classic's public goods. It paid for the 2026 modernization, which Ethereum Classic's core developers carried out, and it maintains and funds the work today as the funder of last resort, with the day-to-day work done by the core developers and the community.
ethereumclassicdao.org2026 onward
Ethereum Classic core developers
Maintain Core-Geth today, in
ethereumclassic/core-gethethereumclassic/core-geth. They resumed maintenance in February 2026, after the 21-month gap, carried out the security work on thev1.12line and disclosed it privately to theetclabscore/core-gethmaintainers. In September 2026 they released thev1.13modernization, which cleared years of technical debt and the security issues still open inv1.12. Run thev1.13line, and track releases atethereumclassic/core-gethfrom here on.
The Core-Geth v1.13 repository
Where the v1.13 line is published, and what it replaced
On December 21, 2024, Core-Geth maintenance moved to ethereumclassic/core-geth from etclabscore/core-geth, as the ETC Cooperative's published roadmap on July 30, 2024 had proposed. The v1.13 line is published here and is the one to run; the v1.12 releases still listed under etclabscore/core-geth are built from the older code and carry security flaws that line never closed.
Documenting the ETC Cooperative handoff: the last commit before the move, December 16, 2024, is preserved on the archive-etclabscore-2024-12 branch and tagged, so the full history up to that point is intact and checkable. Keeping a reference client in the project's own organization is ordinary practice, as with Bitcoin Core at bitcoin/bitcoin and go-ethereum at ethereum/go-ethereum.
ROADMAP: “Move Core Geth to the Ethereum Classic community GitHub repository: This would restore sovereignty of the community on the node client software.” - ETC Cooperative, 2024