January 29th, 2026

vCluster

Platform v4.6 & vCluster v0.31 - Introducing the Free Tier

vCluster Platform is a powerful centralized control plane which lets teams securely run virtual clusters and workloads at scale. Previously, installing the Platform automatically started a two week trial on the Enterprise Ultimate tier, limiting usage to a fixed window. This latest set of releases introduces a new Free Tier which allows users to continue using the Platform for an unlimited amount of time. After installing the platform you will see an activation window as shown below:

Previously licensed versions of the Platform or virtual clusters are unaffected, only new installations will require an activation. Please see our blog (todo link) on the topic, and the pricing page for more detailed plan information on what is included in each tier.

vCluster in Docker (vind)

We are excited to introduce a new engine for running Kubernetes locally. Starting in v0.31, the vCluster CLI can spin up lightweight clusters in seconds, simplifying both your development workflow and the underlying stack. Compared with other engines it has several advantages, including the ability to start or stop clusters, and auto-proxying images from the local Docker daemon.

To create a cluster:

vcluster upgrade --version v0.31.0 
vcluster use driver docker 
vcluster create dev

Now you have a running cluster, which can use all the usual commands from the CLI such as:

vcluster list
vcluster connect/disconnect
vcluster delete
vcluster sleep/wakeup

This project is under active development and will get additional enhancements in the near future, including closer integration with other vCluster features. Let us know what you think!

Experimental Resource Proxy

The new experimental resource proxy feature lets a virtual cluster transparently proxy custom resource requests to another “target” virtual cluster, so users keep working as if the CRDs were local while the actual storage and controllers live elsewhere. This is ideal for centralized resource management and cross-cluster workflows, and it stays safe by default: each client virtual cluster only sees the resources it created, with an optional access mode to expose everything when you need it.

Dive into the examples in the docs

Security Advisories

Along with this release we have published two advisories, the first of which is considered a CVE. Please review the following links for more information and mitigation steps.

Other Announcements & Changes

  • The upstream Ingress-nginx project has published plans for its upcoming retirement, and will cease development in March 2026. As of v0.31.0 we are deprecating any ingress-nginx specific use cases or features, such as our chart annotations, or the ability to deploy it via the CLI or platform. Additionally, solutions and examples that feature the ingress-nginx controller project in our docs have been deprecated and will be removed in the future. We will continue to support the use of ingress controllers, and will further address this area in the future.

  • Helm v4 is now supported to deploy our vCluster or Platform charts

  • Istio 1.28 is now supported

  • The vCluster helm chart now includes an optional PodDisruptionBudget.

vCluster Breaking Changes

  • In v0.26 we introduced a feature to auto-repair embedded etcd in specific situations. After further review and testing we have removed this feature, as in certain cases it can cause instability. This removal has been backported to versions: 0.30.2, 0.29.2, 0.28.1, 0.27.2, and 0.26.4.

  • Network Policies have been significantly revised for enhanced security and flexibility, moving beyond the previous, egress-only approach. Additionally, the configuration now mirrors the standard Kubernetes NetworkPolicy specification.

    Enabling policies.networkPolicy.enabled now activates network policies and automatically deploys necessary default ingress and egress policies for vCluster. In comparison with the previous, control plane ingress/egress external traffic is denied by default.

    The configuration now includes distinct sections for granular control to support all tenancy models. Please refer to the docs for details.

For a list of additional fixes and smaller changes, please refer to the release notes:

For detailed documentation and migration guides, visit vcluster.com/docs and vcluster.com/docs/platform.

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