Istio Release 1.31

Istio Release 1.31

Timeline

• Branch Cut / Feature Freeze: July 20, 2026
• Code Freeze / Release Candidate: August 17, 2026
• Release Date: August 31, 2026 (scheduled)

Patch Releases

N/A

Release Managers

• Jacek Ewertowski - Red Hat (jewertow) (Primary)
• Jackson Greer - Microsoft (jgreeer)
• Jianpeng He - Tetrate.io (zirain)

How do I get my changes into the release?

On July 20, the primary release manager creates the release-1.31 branch from master. Changes merged to master before this date are included; later changes require cherry-picking.

To merge a PR into the release branch:

1. The PR must first merge into master
2. Add the cherrypick/release-1.31 label for automatic cherry-picking
3. Approval requires:
   • The change already exists on master (exception: release-branch-only changes noted in PR description)
   • The change is a bug fix, documentation enhancement, or testing enhancement
   • Risky changes may need feature flags post-1.31.0 release
   • New features or APIs may require TOC approval

See RELEASE_BRANCHES.md for detailed policies.

Release Preparation Issue: #60658

Note: On the istio.io repo, changes should go directly to master until after 1.31 launch, appearing on preliminary.istio.io.