Podman, the popular container management tool developed by Red Hat, is moving to a timed release schedule. Starting now, new versions of Podman will be released during the second week of every February, May, August, and November.
This predictable schedule will simplify integration with other projects, such as Podman Desktop, and will also align more closely with the Red Hat Enterprise Linux release cycle.
Patch releases, however, won’t be tied to this schedule. These will continue to be rolled out whenever necessary, ensuring that important bug fixes and security patches are delivered as soon as possible.
The new release cadence is designed to make things more convenient for developers and users. Knowing exactly when the next Podman release will happen helps projects that rely on it, making testing and integration smoother.
In addition, each release will be preceded by three weeks of release candidates, allowing plenty of time to test and verify the new version.
The first to follow this schedule will be Podman 5.3, set for release during the week of November 11th, 2024. Release candidates for 5.3 start the week of October 21st, giving users and integrators time to prepare.
The release notes of Podman 5.3 will provide further details, including the timeline for the next version (5.4). Refer to the official announcement for more information on the new Podman’s release cycle.
