<p>Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) now offers a direct integration between EKS add-ons and EKS Pod Identity in AWS GovCloud (US) Regions, streamlining the lifecycle management process for critical cluster operational software that needs to interact with AWS services outside the cluster.<br> <br> EKS add-ons that enable integration with underlying AWS resources need IAM permissions to interact with AWS services. EKS Pod Identities simplify how Kubernetes applications obtain AWS IAM permissions. With today's launch, you can directly manage EKS Pod Identities using EKS add-ons operations through the EKS console, CLI, API, eksctl, and IAC tools like AWS CloudFormation, simplifying usage of Pod Identities for EKS add-ons. This integration expands the selection of Pod Identity compatible EKS add-ons available for installation through the EKS console during cluster creation.<br> <br> EKS add-ons integration with Pod Identities is generally available in AWS GovCloud (US-East) and AWS GovCloud (US-West) Regions. To get started, see the <a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/create-cluster.html">EKS user guide</a>.</p>

<p>AWS Batch now extends its job scheduling capabilities to unmanaged compute environments on Amazon EKS. With unmanaged EKS compute environments, you can leverage AWS Batch's job orchestration while maintaining full control over your Kubernetes infrastructure for security, compliance, or operational requirements.<br> <br> With this capability, you can create unmanaged compute environments through CreateComputeEnvironment API and AWS Batch console by selecting your existing EKS cluster and specifying a Kubernetes namespace, then associate your EKS nodes with the compute environment using <i>kubectl</i> labeling.<br> <br> AWS Batch supports developers, scientists, and engineers in running efficient batch processing for ML model training, simulations, and analysis at any scale. Unmanaged compute environments on Amazon EKS are available today in all <a href="https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/global-infrastructure/regional-product-services/">AWS regions</a> where AWS Batch is available. For more information, see the <a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/batch/latest/userguide/create-compute-environment-unmanaged-eks.html">AWS Batch User Guide</a>.</p>

A Helm chart for AWS EBS CSI Driver

In this post, we demonstrate a solution that uses Amazon Data Firehose to aggregate logs from the Amazon EKS control plane and data plane, and send them to Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3). Finally, we use Amazon Q Business and its Amazon S3 connector to synchronize the logs, index the log data in Amazon S3, and enable a chat experience powered by the generative AI capabilities of Amazon Q Business.

Machine learning (ML) intensive companies face significant challenges in efficiently managing training data. This post introduces a solution to build an ephemeral, cloud-native elastic high-throughput file system. By the end of this post, you will learn how to implement the elastic high-throughput file system using Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) and CNCF Fluid, set […]

Note There are no changes to the AMI template in this release.

What's Changed • cut docs v0.8.3 by @michaelhtm in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/1001 • fix(test): measure pkg/ coverage in integration tests by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/996 • chore: remove managed-by label from kro instances by @shabbskagalwala in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/997 Full Changelog: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/compare/v0.8.3...v0.8.4

What's Changed • cut docs v0.8.2 by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/999 • fix: unify finalizer and label patches, add cascading deletion integration test by @jakobmoellerdev in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/1000 Full Changelog: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/compare/v0.8.2...v0.8.3

What's Changed • docs: cutoff 0.8.1 by @jakobmoellerdev in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/989 • update kro cli go.mod to use kro v0.8.1 by @michaelhtm in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/992 • Fix cmd/kro by updating Kro dependency to v0.8.1 by @chrisdoherty4 in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/994 • fix: filter child events by parent instance GVK by @shabbskagalwala in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/986 • fix: remove GIT_VERSION suffix by @michaelhtm in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/991 New Contributors • @chrisdoherty4 made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/994 Full Changelog: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/compare/v0.8.1...v0.8.2

<p>Kubernetes version 1.35 introduced several new features and bug fixes, and AWS is excited to announce that you can now use <a href="https://aws.amazon.com/eks/">Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service</a> (EKS) and <a href="https://aws.amazon.com/eks/eks-distro/">Amazon EKS Distro</a> to run Kubernetes version 1.35. Starting today, you can create new EKS clusters using version 1.35 and upgrade existing clusters to version 1.35 using the EKS console, the eksctl command line interface, or through an infrastructure-as-code tool.<br> <br> Kubernetes version 1.35 introduces several key improvements, including In-Place Pod Resource Updates allowing CPU and memory adjustments without restarting Pods, and PreferSameNode Traffic Distribution prioritizing local endpoints before routing to remote nodes for reduced latency. The release brings Node Topology Labels via Downward API enabling Pods to access region and zone information without API server queries, alongside Image Volumes delivering data artifacts like AI models using OCI container images. To learn more about the changes in Kubernetes version 1.35, see our <a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/kubernetes-versions-standard.html">documentation</a> and the Kubernetes project <a href="https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/blob/master/CHANGELOG/CHANGELOG-1.34.md">release notes.</a><br> <br> EKS now supports Kubernetes version 1.35 in all the AWS Regions where EKS is available, including the AWS GovCloud (US) Regions.<br> <br> You can learn more about the Kubernetes versions available on EKS and instructions to update your cluster to version 1.35 by visiting EKS documentation. You can use <a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/cluster-insights.html">EKS cluster insights</a> to check if there are any issues that can impact your Kubernetes cluster upgrades. EKS Distro builds of Kubernetes version 1.35 are available through ECR Public Gallery and GitHub. Learn more about the EKS version lifecycle policies in the <a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/kubernetes-versions.html">documentation</a>.</p>

What's Changed • fix(transform): update parent default logic for schemas with required fields by @jakobmoellerdev in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/983 Full Changelog: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/compare/v0.8.0...v0.8.1

What's Changed • Replace panic in CRD Graph Builder with proper error handling by @AnshulPatil2005 in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/901 • docs: correct apiVersion for Application example by @birapjr in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/899 • docs: cutoff 0.7.1 by @jakobmoellerdev in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/896 • cleanup: use variadic append for enum values by @PhantomInTheWire in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/910 • fix: Fixed Quickstart instance.yaml sample on document by @ricky9408 in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/913 • Prevent random.* from being classified as a resource by @benzaidfoued in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/919 • Improve CRD cleanup skip log clarity by @skools-here in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/923 • Docs: manifests download URL changed to match actual URL by @hatofmonkeys in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/925 • chore(deps): bump qs from 6.13.0 to 6.14.1 in /website in the npm_and_yarn group across 1 directory by @dependabot[bot] in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/929 • Fix url in kubectl commands for upgrade and delete using kubectl manifests by @Fsero in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/938 • fix: Support []object and map[string]object types in RGD schema by @kunalvirwal in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/939 • fix: Convert CEL type to Go type recursively by @cirias in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/940 • chore: cache compiled CEL programs by @bschaatsbergen in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/943 • chore: bump pinned version by @bschaatsbergen in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/945 • Update AWS cluster management example to use EKS capabilities by @iamahgoub in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/946 • feat: add bytes conversion to go native types by @shabbskagalwala in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/951 • chore: bump kro in kro command by @tjamet in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/952 • test: improve unit test coverage for pkg/graph/variable by @shivansh-gohem in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/949 • chore: bump controller-runtime to v0.23.0 and k8s deps to v0.35.0 by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/956 • feat: add controller warmup support for improved leader failover by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/955 • fix(dag): preserve vertex order when dependencies are satisfied by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/958 • feat: add DurationType and TimestampType conversion to go native types by @shabbskagalwala in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/960 • chore(deps): bump qs from 6.13.0 to 6.14.1 in /website in the npm_and_yarn group across 1 directory by @dependabot[bot] in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/964 • chore: dependency bumps (go1.25.6, golangci-lint, helm, ko, chainsaw, and more) by @jakobmoellerdev in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/963 • chore(deps): bump lodash from 4.17.21 to 4.17.23 in /website in the npm_and_yarn group across 1 directory by @dependabot[bot] in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/965 • add support for labels and annotations in the generated CRDs by @cnvergence in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/916 • Cluster management example: ensure access to workload cluster is granted before Argo CD secret creation by @iamahgoub in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/966 • feat: add Collections support + runtime/controller rewrite by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/936 • fix(schema): use date-time format for timestamps by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/973 • Regenerate CRDs to reflect new schema.metadata field by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/977 • fix(schema): preserve nested array/object paths in status schema by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/972 • docs(cel): explain multiline expressions and YAML chomping by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/974 • docs: expand collections gotchas and cross-references by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/971 • fix(website): version CRD with docs snapshots by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/978 • fix(graph): reject cluster-scoped resources with namespace set by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/976 • KREP-002: add declarative resource collections support by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/679 • refactor(instance): align node state tracking by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/970 • feat(crd): Prevent breaking changes in RGD schemas by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/352 • feat: support recursive references in custom types (Supersedes #714) by @shivansh-gohem in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/950 • fix(release): capture GIT_VERSION once to prevent -dirty suffix in LDFAGS by @a-hilaly in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/982 • feat: add early validation for apiVersion and kind to fail fast by @antcybersec in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/980 New Contributors • @AnshulPatil2005 made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/901 • @birapjr made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/899 • @PhantomInTheWire made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/910 • @ricky9408 made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/913 • @benzaidfoued made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/919 • @skools-here made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/923 • @hatofmonkeys made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/925 • @Fsero made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/938 • @kunalvirwal made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/939 • @cirias made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/940 • @shabbskagalwala made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/951 • @shivansh-gohem made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/949 • @cnvergence made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/pull/916 Full Changelog: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kro/compare/v0.7.1...v0.8.0

What's Changed • feat: allow disabling mount of SOCI directory by @fletcherw in https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/pull/2588 • Add retry to net.LookupHost() in nodeadm by @nkvetsinski in https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/pull/2585 Full Changelog: https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/compare/v20260114...v20260120

AWS EBS CSI Driver CHANGELOG See CHANGELOG for full list of changes

Note There are no changes to the AMI template in this release.

A Helm chart for AWS EBS CSI Driver

📚 Quick Links v3.0.0 (requires Kubernetes 1.22+) Image: public.ecr.aws/eks/aws-load-balancer-controller:v3.0.0 Documentation Thanks to all our contributors!💜💜💜 🎉 Gateway API is Now GA! We are excited to announce that Gateway API support is now Generally Available (GA) in AWS Load Balancer Controller v3.0.0! This milestone marks the production-ready status of Gateway API features for managing AWS Application Load Balancers and Network Load Balancers through the Kubernetes Gateway API. We encourage you to try it out and welcome any feedback via GitHub Issues. For more gateway api details, please refer to our live doc. ⚠️ Action Required Webhook Certificate Issue • Issue: #4359 attempted to fix a race condition in webhook certificate renewal but introduced a critical bug. The aws-load-balancer-tls Secret persists but the Certificate that owned and renewed it was removed, causing eventual certificate expiration and webhook TLS failures (#4541). This prevents the controller from updating target group bindings and can lead to outages. This bug impacts users deploying with Helm and utilizing the enableCertManager=true flag. • Action for users staying on older versions: Set keepTLSSecret=false in your helm chart to mitigate the issue • Action for users upgrading to v3.0.0: No action required - the fix is included in this release 🔧 Enhancements and Fixes • Helm Chart Version Alignment: Helm chart version now aligns with LBC version. Previously, LBC v2.x used Helm chart v1.x (e.g., LBC v2.17 = Helm v1.17). Starting with v3.0.0, both versions match. • Gateway Deletion: Removed route count check when deleting gateways, allowing deletion of gateways with attached routes (#4549) • Subnet Ordering: Fixed subnet order preservation when using aws-load-balancer-subnets annotation - now maintains requested order instead of non-deterministic ordering (#4504) • AZ Mismatch Fix: Fixed orphaned targets issue caused by AvailabilityZone mismatch in refreshUnhealthyTargets - targets are now properly deregistered regardless of cached AZ (#4544) • NLB Target Group Limit: Fixed target group association limit error for weighted configs by including base service UID in target group name generation (#4540) • Listener Error Propagation: Fixed target group tuple error messages not being propagated to end users (#4545) • Webhook Certificate: Reverted race condition fix in webhook certificate renewal that caused issues (#4542) 📋 Full Changelog • Revert "fix: Race condition in webhook certificate renewal with cert-… by @zac-nixon in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4542 • Fix NLB target group association limit issue for weighted configs by @shraddhabang in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4540 • Fix AZ mismatch in refreshUnhealthyTargets causing orphaned targets by @MinhNguyen-at in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4544 • Update model_build_listener.go by @zac-nixon in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4545 • Fix: preserve requested order for subnets when using aws-load-balancer-subnets annotation by @nelsen129 in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4504 • Remove KeepTLS parameter in helm chart by @zac-nixon in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4548 • [gateway api] remove route count check for deleting gateway by @zac-nixon in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4549 • [feat gateway-api]update gw api doc by @shuqz in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4550 • cut v3.0.0 release by @shuqz in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4551 New Contributors • @MinhNguyen-at made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4544 • @nelsen129 made their first contribution in https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/pull/4504 Full Changelog: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-load-balancer-controller/compare/v2.17.1...v3.0.0

This blog post dives deeper into optimizing Amazon EKS Auto Mode clusters using AWS&nbsp;Graviton and Amazon EC2&nbsp;Spot instances. AWS customers adopt AWS Graviton instances to achieve up to 40% higher price-performance ratio and up to 60% less energy to meet their sustainability goals. Additionally, AWS customers use Amazon EC2 Spot instances for eligible workloads to save up to 90% on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) On-Demand costs.

Commits • f29079c: (Backport v1.8.x) chore: update aws api data for new g7e instance family (#8869) (Joshua Guo) #8869

In this blog post, we show how to create and manage a fleet of Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) clusters using Kube Resource Orchestrator (kro), AWS Controllers for Kubernetes (ACK), and Argo CD. These tools allow you to implement a GitOps-based cluster management solution to increase productivity and improve consistency and standardization by using the Kubernetes API for end-to-end operations.

In this post, we walk you through building an end-to-end recovery system, showing you how to configure traffic shifting that protects your applications from Availability Zone impairments while maintaining the high availability that your business demands.

What's Changed • fix(neuron): install aws-neuronx-dkms-2.21 at boot on inf1 by @mselim00 in https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/pull/2579 • chore(docs): backfill CHANGELOG.md for release v20251217 by @mselim00 in https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/pull/2583 • Revert "fix(al2023): Only enable DNS for the primary interface to avoid duplicate entries (#2578)" by @shvbsle in https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/pull/2584 Full Changelog: https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-eks-ami/compare/v20260107...v20260114

Chores • bump upstream karpenter to v1.8.2 (#8847) #8847 (Jigisha Patil)

Tests • Bump upgrade commit pin (#8768) #8769 (Ryan Mistretta) Chores • Bump Upstream Karpenter to include patch changes (#8834) #8834 (Amanuel Engeda) • update static instance data (#8833) #8833 (Jason Deal) • Bump Upstream Karpenter to v1.8.1 (#8839) #8839 (Amanuel Engeda)

This blog post examines how Salesforce, operating one of the world's largest Kubernetes deployments, successfully migrated from Cluster Autoscaler to Karpenter across their fleet of 1,000 plus Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) clusters.