Kubernetes Enhancement Proposals (KEPs) define how new features, deprecations and design changes are introduced into Kubernetes. Over time, the KEP and release processes have evolved to improve traceability, stability and production readiness.

As part of the Release Team’s Enhancements subteam under SIG Release, we track and guide enhancements through each milestone, managing freezes such as Enhancements & Code Freeze, and the newly enforced PRR Freeze (which was a soft deadline before), now requires production readiness reviews to be completed earlier.

This session covers the KEP lifecycle from two perspectives: the Release Team, who ensures enhancements are on track and meet requirements and contributors, who author and implement them. We’ll discuss recent process changes, including the introduction of a hard PRR Freeze, how it enforces production readiness earlier in the cycle and how it affects the broader release timeline (Enhancements & Code Freeze and Exception handling).