Highlights from this release include network policy support using sigs.k8s.io/kube-network-policies (thanks @aojea!) and support for building node images from pre-compiled Kubernetes releases (thanks @dims!).

For building images, see the docs at https://kind.sigs.k8s.io/docs/user/quick-start/#building-images

Breaking Changes

• The default node image is now Kubernetes v1.31.0: kindest/node:v1.31.0@sha256:53df588e04085fd41ae12de0c3fe4c72f7013bba32a20e7325357a1ac94ba865

New Features

• Out-of-the-box support for network policy via sigs.k8s.io/kube-network-policies
  • Advanced users can still disable kindnetd and install your own CNI with https://kind.sigs.k8s.io/docs/user/configuration/#disable-default-cni, however note that this is a "power user" feature and KIND does not offer support for any third-party CNI
• Support for building node images from existing Kubernetes releases
  • NOTE: For Kubernetes releases before v1.31.0, this will result in larger images because kind opted in to compiling out remaining in-tree cloud providers with a build tag when publishing images. For v1.31.0+ there is no difference.
  • See: https://kind.sigs.k8s.io/docs/user/quick-start/#building-images
• Support for loading multiple image archives in kind load image-archive
  • NOTE: it is still more efficient to do a single archive in most cases
• Migrated to skipPhase in Init/JoinConfiguration instead of the kubeadm flags, making it possible for users to cutomize the phases (at your own risk!) with config patches
• powershell completion
• Updated dependencies, including, but not limited to:
  • containerd 1.7.18
  • runc 1.1.13
  • go 1.22.6
  • CNI plugins to 1.5.1
  • pause 3.10
• Docs and clarification for third party install options including scoop and winget

Images pre-built for this release:

• v1.31.0: kindest/node:v1.31.0@sha256:53df588e04085fd41ae12de0c3fe4c72f7013bba32a20e7325357a1ac94ba865
• v1.30.4: kindest/node:v1.30.4@sha256:976ea815844d5fa93be213437e3ff5754cd599b040946b5cca43ca45c2047114
• v1.30.3: kindest/node:v1.30.3@sha256:bf91e1ef2f7d92bb7734b2b896b3dddea98f0496b34d96e37dd5d7df331b7e56
• v1.29.8: kindest/node:v1.29.8@sha256:d46b7aa29567e93b27f7531d258c372e829d7224b25e3fc6ffdefed12476d3aa
• v1.29.7: kindest/node:v1.29.7@sha256:f70ab5d833fca132a100c1f95490be25d76188b053f49a3c0047ff8812360baf
• v1.28.13: kindest/node:v1.28.13@sha256:45d319897776e11167e4698f6b14938eb4d52eb381d9e3d7a9086c16c69a8110
• v1.28.12: kindest/node:v1.28.12@sha256:fa0e48b1e83bb8688a5724aa7eebffbd6337abd7909ad089a2700bf08c30c6ea
• v1.27.16: kindest/node:v1.27.17@sha256:3fd82731af34efe19cd54ea5c25e882985bafa2c9baefe14f8deab1737d9fabe
• v1.26.15: kindest/node:v1.26.15@sha256:1cc15d7b1edd2126ef051e359bf864f37bbcf1568e61be4d2ed1df7a3e87b354
• v1.25.16: kindest/node:v1.25.16@sha256:6110314339b3b44d10da7d27881849a87e092124afab5956f2e10ecdb463b025

NOTE: You must use the @sha256 digest to guarantee an image built for this release, until such a time as we switch to a different tagging scheme. Even then we will highly encourage digest pinning for security and reproducibility reasons.

See also:

• https://kind.sigs.k8s.io/docs/user/quick-start/#creating-a-cluster
• https://kind.sigs.k8s.io/docs/user/quick-start/#building-images

NOTE: These node images support amd64 and arm64, both of our supported platforms. You must use the same platform as your host, for more context see https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kind/issues/2718

Fixes

• Fix kubeadm v1beta3 config template for kubeProxyMode: none
• Stop disabling LocalStorageIsolation for rootless clusters (which no longer appears to be necessary to avoid crashes)

Contributors

Thank you to everyone who contributed to this release! ❤️

Users whose commits are in this release (alphabetically by user name)

• @abhay-krishna
• @aojea
• @BenTheElder
• @bzsuni
• @cpanato
• @dependabot[bot]
• @dominicqi
• @douglaswth
• @giuseppe
• @harshanarayana
• @joycecodes
• @k8s-ci-robot
• @kundan2707
• @netguino
• @nojnhuh
• @pohly
• @ste93cry
• @stmcginnis

Thank you as well to everyone who contributed in other ways like filing issues, giving feedback, testing fixes, and helping users in slack!