Grafana and Grafana Cloud release cycle: An end-of-year update

With the end of the year fast approaching, we want to let you know about some important dates for our upcoming release freezes.

Our annual release freeze helps ensure stability for everyone during the holiday season, which is a critical time for many of our customers. This pause helps us protect our on-call teams and maintain a smooth experience for you.

This year, the freeze will be in effect during two periods:

• Nov. 26 - Dec. 2. Notably, the release for the slow channel (more on this below) on Nov. 24 will not happen on that day, and will instead be moved to Dec. 3, after the freeze period ends.
• Dec. 19 - Jan. 5

During these times, there will be no regularly scheduled updates to Grafana Cloud, Grafana Enterprise, or Grafana OSS. And of course, the freeze does not apply to any changes needed for an operational or security incident.

Rolling release channels in Grafana Cloud: what you need to know

You may have noticed the reference to the “slow channel” in the previous section. Or perhaps you’ve seen references before to our rolling release channels for Grafana Cloud. But what exactly does that mean for you? Well, this is as good a time as any to help get you up to speed.

The rolling release channels are all about getting the latest features, improvements, and security fixes into your hands faster, without you having to lift a finger. Think of it as our way of continuously delivering the good stuff.

Instead of big, infrequent updates, we’re constantly shipping, which means you get access to the newest features and fixes as soon as they’re ready. This approach also allows us to be super responsive to security vulnerabilities and other important issues.

We have a few different channels to suit your needs:

• Fast: This channel gets updated daily on weekdays. It’s the perfect place to get a sneak peek at new features and fixes.
• Steady: This one gets a weekly update, typically on Tuesdays. It’s a great balance of getting new stuff quickly while maintaining a predictable cadence.
• Slow: This gets updated on the fourth Monday of each month, this channel is for those who prefer a more conservative update schedule.

For our Grafana Cloud Pro and Advanced users, you have the flexibility to choose the channel that works best for your production instances. You can even move your non-production instances to the “Fast” channel to check out what’s coming up next! (Forever-free accounts will remain on their assigned channels). To switch channels, simply contact the Grafana Labs Support team through your Grafana Cloud admin portal.

We know how important stability is, and we take great care to ensure that all changes are thoroughly tested. While we do everything we can to prevent bugs from reaching any channel, if one does slip through, we’ll be on it quickly to get it fixed.

This release cadence applies to the core Grafana visualization platform. Other products like Grafana Cloud Logs, Grafana Cloud Metrics, and Grafana Cloud Traces are updated independently.

We hope this update helps you better understand how our releases will be impacted by the release freezes. If you have any questions, reach out to our support team. 

Happy monitoring, and happy holidays!

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