Managed Kubernetes

For GKE Standard CPU node pools, GKE can now upgrade nodes by updating the existing Compute Engine VM in place, instead of deleting the VM and creating a new…

For GKE Standard CPU node pools, GKE can now upgrade nodes by updating the existing Compute Engine VM in place, instead of deleting the VM and creating a new one. Because the node keeps its underlying VM, it also keeps its compute capacity during the upgrade.

(2026-R44) Version updates

Note: Your clusters might not have these versions available. Rollouts are already in progress when we publish the release notes, and can take multiple days to complete across all Google Cloud zones.

(2026-R44) Security updates

This release includes new GKE versions that use updated Container-Optimized OS images. These updated images are cumulative, incorporating security fixes from all Container-Optimized OS versions released since the previous GKE release.

Fixed an issue in GKE Sandbox where Pods using the Cloud Storage FUSE CSI driver could become indefinitely stuck in a Terminating state.

To resolve this issue, upgrade your node pools to GKE version 1.37.1-gke.1552000 or later and add the dev.gvisor.fuse.abort-on-teardown: "true" annotation to your Pod or Deployment metadata.

Backup for GKE is now available in the following region: asia-southeast3 (Bangkok, Thailand).

For more information, see Backup for GKE locations.

Generally Available: Managed StandardV2 NAT Gateway for AKS

AKS will now provision and manage a StandardV2 NAT Gateway for clusters using an AKS-managed virtual network.

(2026-R43) Security updates

This release includes new GKE versions that use updated Container-Optimized OS images. These updated images are cumulative, incorporating security fixes from all Container-Optimized OS versions released since the previous GKE release.

(2026-R43) Version updates

Note: Your clusters might not have these versions available. Rollouts are already in progress when we publish the release notes, and can take multiple days to complete across all Google Cloud zones.

Generally Available: Anyscale on Azure

Anyscale on Azure is now Generally Available. Anyscale on Azure is a managed platform for running distributed Python workloads on Ray. It deploys directly onto your Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) cluster and integrates with the Azure services your team already uses.

The microVM sandbox type is now Generally Available (GA) with GKE Sandbox in clusters that run version 1.37.0-gke.4713000 and later.

MicroVM sandboxes provide hardware virtualization and isolation for untrusted workloads, AI agent runtimes, and multi-tenant environments.

Retirement: Pod name dimension in AKS pod platform metrics

Beginning September 30, 2027, support for the pod name dimension on the following Azure Monitor platform metrics is retiring, and these metrics are transitioning to aggregate pod counters: Number of pods by phase (kube_pod_status_phase)

Public Preview: AKS on bare metal now on Ubuntu

Running Kubernetes on-premises often means adding a virtualization layer, adapting to unfamiliar infrastructure, or giving up control over the hardware and software your applications depend on.

Starting with GKE version 1.36, the default engine for kube-dns is CoreDNS.

For Pod IP DNS queries in the <a-b-c-d>.<namespace>.pod.cluster.local format, CoreDNS returns NXDOMAIN if the specified <namespace> does not exist.

AWS Batch now supports Amazon EKS access entry authentication

AWS Batch now supports Amazon EKS access entry authentication for compute environments. EKS access entries provide an API-driven approach to granting IAM principals access to Kubernetes clusters, complementing the existing aws-auth ConfigMap.

GKE support for using the c4-standard-* machine types (up to 192 vCPUs) as Confidential GKE Nodes with Intel TDX is generally available.

For more information, see the following pages:

Starting on July 1, 2026, Identity Service for GKE is deprecated in GKE version 1.36 and earlier.

This feature is also unavailable in organizations that were created on or after July 1, 2025. GKE version 1.37 and later don't support Identity Service for GKE. Before you upgrade clusters to 1.37 and later, disable this feature and migrate to Workforce Identity Federation.

Amazon EKS and Amazon EKS Distro now support Kubernetes version 1.37

Kubernetes version 1.37 introduced several new features and bug fixes, and AWS is excited to announce that you can now use Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) and Amazon EKS Distro to run Kubernetes version 1.37.

In GKE control plane versions 1.36.3-gke.1244000 and later, Cloud Storage FUSE CSI driver (gcsfusecsi-node) DaemonSet Pods fail to start on specific node pools.

In GKE control plane versions 1.36.3-gke.1244000 and later, Cloud Storage FUSE CSI driver ( gcsfusecsi-node ) DaemonSet Pods fail to start on specific node pools. The Pods crash and log the following error:

(2026-R42) Version updates

Note: Your clusters might not have these versions available. Rollouts are already in progress when we publish the release notes, and can take multiple days to complete across all Google Cloud zones. The following versions are now available: 1.34.12-gke.1011000

You can use Vertical Pod Autoscaler (VPA) with Horizontal Pod Autoscaler (HPA) to automatically optimize container CPU requests for workloads that scale…

You can use Vertical Pod Autoscaler (VPA) with Horizontal Pod Autoscaler (HPA) to automatically optimize container CPU requests for workloads that scale replicas based on CPU utilization.