Kubernetes Release Cycle: What the New Three-Month Rule Means for You

On April 23, 2021, the release team adopted a Kubernetes Enhancement Proposal (KEP) that changes the release cycle from four releases per year to three releases per year. This decision brings some significant changes for the Kubernetes community.

What Exactly is Changing?

Starting with the Kubernetes 1.22 version, a lightweight framework will be used to create the release schedule. The key points are:

The first Kubernetes version of a calendar year should begin in the second or third week of January to give contributors more time after the holidays.
The last Kubernetes version of a calendar year should be completed by mid-December.
A Kubernetes release cycle lasts approximately 15 weeks.
The week of KubeCon + CloudNativeCon is not considered a “working week” for SIG Release. The release team does not hold meetings or make decisions during this time.
There is an explicit SIG Release pause of at least two weeks between each release cycle.

As a result, Kubernetes will now release three times a year. Version 1.23 will be the last release of the calendar year 2021. This new regulation ensures a very predictable release schedule, making it easier to plan upcoming release dates:

Proposed Kubernetes Release Schedule for the Rest of 2021

Week of the Year	Release Number	Release Week	Note
35	1.23	1 (August 23)
50	1.23	16 (December 7)	KubeCon + CloudNativeCon NA pause (October 11-15)

Proposed Kubernetes Release Schedule for 2022

Week of the Year	Release Number	Release Week	Note
1	1.24	1 (January 3)
15	1.24	15 (April 12)
17	1.25	1 (April 26)	KubeCon + CloudNativeCon EU is expected to take place
32	1.25	15 (August 9)
34	1.26	1 (August 22)	KubeCon + CloudNativeCon NA is expected to take place
49	1.26	14 (December 6)

These proposed dates reflect only the start and end dates and are subject to change. The release team will set dates for freeze phases and other milestones at the beginning of each release. More information on these milestones can be found in the release phases documentation. Feedback from previous releases will be incorporated into this process.

What Does This Mean for End Users?

The biggest change for end users is the slower release frequency and delayed graduation of enhancements. The Kubernetes release artifacts, release notes, and all other aspects of a release remain unchanged.

Before this change, an enhancement could graduate from Alpha to Stable within 9 months. With the new release frequency, this period will extend to 12 months. Additionally, the graduation of features in recent releases has sometimes been driven by the activities of the release team.

With fewer releases, users can expect the rate of feature graduation to slow down. At the same time, releases are expected to contain a larger number of improvements, which users need to be aware of during upgrades. However, with fewer releases per year, it is intended that end-user organizations spend less time on upgrades and gain more time to support their Kubernetes clusters. Moreover, this means that Kubernetes releases will be supported for a slightly longer period, making bug fixes and security patches available for a longer duration.

In this new phase, ayedo, as a Kubernetes partner, is ready to support you in adapting to the changes in the release cycle and help you make the most of the new releases.

Source: Kubernetes Blog