[BUG]: ubuntu latest is set to 2404 not 2204 as per documentation

[almmechanics]

What happened?

Description

Running ubuntu-latest for pipelines report back as 2404 instead of 2204 as per documentation

2025-04-09T08:52:56.8020788Z ##[group]Operating System
2025-04-09T08:52:56.8021015Z Ubuntu
2025-04-09T08:52:56.8021201Z 24.04.2
2025-04-09T08:52:56.8021314Z LTS

SQL Tooling expected for ubuntu-latest is no longer present - not previously documented as a feature of the migration

Platforms affected

• Azure DevOps
• GitHub Actions - Standard Runners
• GitHub Actions - Larger Runners

Runner images affected

• Ubuntu 20.04
• Ubuntu 22.04
• Ubuntu 24.04
• macOS 13
• macOS 13 Arm64
• macOS 14
• macOS 14 Arm64
• macOS 15
• macOS 15 Arm64
• Windows Server 2019
• Windows Server 2022
• Windows Server 2025

Image version and build link

Current documentation indicates the Ubuntu image versions as follows

Ubuntu 22.04 ubuntu-22.04 ubuntu-latest OR ubuntu-22.04 Link
Ubuntu 20.04 ubuntu-20.04 ubuntu-20.04 Link
Ubuntu 24.04 ubuntu-24.04 ubuntu-24.04 Link

Taken from https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/pipelines/agents/hosted?view=azure-devops&tabs=yamlUbuntu

Is it regression?

Reported in the logging as 24.04.2 LTS

Expected behavior

Latest to be in sync with the documentation

Actual behavior

Incorrect version being used

Repro steps

1. Create a pipeline with ubuntu-latest as the Agent Specification (YAML or Classic have the same results)
   

2.Create a simple task i.e. a Bash Script to run uname -a
3. Run Pipeline and review the Initialize Job logged output

Reports back as 24.04

Versions

2025-04-09T08:52:56.7973993Z Current agent version: '3.251.0'

Environment type (Please select at least one enviroment where you face this issue)

• Self-Hosted
• Microsoft Hosted
• VMSS Pool
• Container

Azure DevOps Server type

dev.azure.com (formerly visualstudio.com)

Azure DevOps Server Version (if applicable)

No response

Operation system

No response

Version controll system

No response

Relevant log output

1. Create a pipeline with `ubuntu-latest` as the Agent Specification (YAML or Classic have the same results)
    ![Image](https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/0790d195-abad-4849-bc91-b6fd5068601f)

2.Create a simple task i.e. a Bash Script to run `uname -a`
3.  Run Pipeline and review the `Initialize Job` logged output
    ![Image](https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/e3ef4a38-dcef-4e7e-b900-61e4811a9110)

Reports back as 24.04

[Lucero7919]

Seeing a similar issue - where I assume ubuntu-latest was still ubuntu-22.04 it seems to now be 24.04. This causes subsequent issues if your Pipeline Agents are running on 4.253.0 you'll get issues such as:

eg:

##[warning]See https://aka.ms/azdo-ubuntu-24.04 for changes to the ubuntu-24.04 image. Some tools (e.g. Mono, NuGet, Terraform) are not available on the image. Therefore some tasks do not run or have reduced functionality.

and

Starting: Terraform init 
==============================================================================
Task         : Terraform
Description  : Execute terraform commands to manage resources on AzureRM, Amazon Web Services(AWS) and Google Cloud Platform(GCP). v4.241.11
Version      : 4.241.33
Author       : Microsoft Corporation
Help         : [Learn more about this task](https://aka.ms/devlabs/ado/tf/task/v4)
==============================================================================
##[error]Error: Failed to find terraform tool in paths
Finishing: Terraform init

Downgrading the YAML pipeline to 22.04 ironically removes both these issues (even the deprecated tool warning)

[sicil1ano]

This bug is already solved. Both the linked PR (actions/runner-images#11976) and Microsoft's documentation are now referring to ubuntu-latest as Ubuntu 24.04 (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/pipelines/agents/hosted?view=azure-devops&tabs=linux-images%2Cyaml).