The short answer is that there are really two different exit paths for rETH: selling it on a market, or redeeming against protocol-side ETH liquidity when that liquidity is available. Rocket Pool's Atlas documentation shows that protocol cash flow can route ETH back into the deposit pool and support unstaking at the protocol rate, while later governance work shows that timely withdrawal liquidity is still an active design concern. So rETH redemption is real, but it is not best understood as an unconditional instant-burn promise in every protocol state.
Market exit and protocol redemption are not the same thing
When people talk about getting out of rETH, they can mean two different things. One is selling rETH to someone else in a market such as a DEX. The other is redeeming or unstaking against protocol-side ETH at the protocol rate when Rocket Pool has that liquidity available.
That distinction matters because market liquidity and protocol-side redemption capacity are related but not identical. Someone might be able to exit through trading even when protocol-side liquidity is constrained, and protocol-side redemption design can matter even when secondary-market trading is active.
Where protocol-side redemption liquidity comes from today
Rocket Pool's Atlas documentation explains that when skimmed rewards are distributed, the rETH holders' share flows back into the deposit pool. That matters because the deposit pool is one of the places protocol-side ETH can become available for unstaking at the protocol rate.
So protocol-side redemption liquidity is partly a function of ordinary protocol cash flow and ETH routing, not only of a separate purpose-built withdrawal queue.
Why timing can still be uneven
RPIP-74 explicitly treats support for redemptions as a governance priority when discussing deposit-pool usage. That is strong evidence that redemption liquidity is important enough to shape queue behavior and broader ETH-allocation policy.
In practice, protocol-side ETH does not appear from nowhere. Redemption timing depends on broader protocol liquidity conditions, returned ETH, and how Rocket Pool chooses to direct available capital. That is why redemptions are best understood as a live liquidity question rather than a guaranteed instant path in every system state.
What draft governance work is trying to change
Draft RPIP-71 goes further and describes a future where pool stakers can signal a wish to unstake at the protocol rate and have validator exits more explicitly help satisfy that demand. The proposal is clear that this is draft-stage governance work, not a final already-deployed standard.
That makes RPIP-71 useful as direction-of-travel evidence. It should not be read as proof that the full user-signaled withdrawal-liquidity system already exists in production today.
What this means for users
If someone wants the practical answer, they should separate market exit from protocol redemption and assume that protocol-side redemption speed depends on current liquidity conditions.
If they want the governance answer, they should know Rocket Pool is clearly trying to improve the redemption experience, but the most ambitious withdrawal-liquidity work is still draft-stage rather than final protocol law.