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For critical changes, refer to the upgrade notes.

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Breaking Changes

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UEFI Boot

Talos 1.10 now uses the systemd-boot bootloader and Unified Kernel Images (UKIs) for UEFI systems. Previously, this was limited to Secure Boot systems. Upgrades from Talos 1.9 retain the existing bootloader, so this applies only to fresh installations. UKIs bundle the kernel, initramfs, and kernel command line arguments into a single file, making kernel arguments unmodifiable without upgrading the UKI. Consequently, the .machine.install.extraKernelArgs field in the machine config is ignored when using systemd-boot. Ensure the correct platform-specific installer image is used during upgrades or installations, as it includes Talos-specific talos.platform arguments. Tools like Image Factory and Omni handle this automatically. Image Factory now supports <platform>-installer images (e.g., aws-installer for Amazon EC2) with the appropriate kernel arguments.

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System Extensions

Starting with Talos 1.10, .machine.install.extensions is deprecated and has no effect. The field remains for compatibility with older versions. Use Boot Assets instead. The installer image is now smaller as tools for host-side extension installation have been removed.

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cgroups v1

Talos no longer supports cgroupsv1 in non-container mode. The kernel argument talos.unified_cgroup_hierarchy is ignored.
Note: Talos has defaulted to cgroups v2 for a long time, so this change should not impact most users.

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New Features

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User Volumes

Talos introduces user disk volumes via the UserVolumeConfig machine config. The .machine.disks field is deprecated but remains for backward compatibility.

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Driver Rebind

A new machine config, PCIDriverRebindConfig, allows rebinding PCI device drivers to different targets.

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Ethernet Configuration

Talos now supports ethtool-style Ethernet configuration via EthernetConfig. Interface status can be checked with talosctl get ethernetstatus.

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Dual-Boot Disk Images and ISOs

For x86, Talos provides dual-boot disk and ISO images that use GRUB for legacy BIOS and systemd-boot for UEFI. On first boot, Talos determines the boot method and removes the unused bootloader. For arm64, Talos now uses systemd-boot. Secure Boot images exclusively use systemd-boot as Secure Boot is UEFI-only. Imager supports bootloader selection when generating disk images: 
output:
  kind: image
  imageOptions:
    bootloader: sd-boot # supported options are sd-boot, grub, dual-boot

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SELinux

Talos Linux by default now ships an experimental SELinux policy which protects the base operating system from unauthorized access. The default SELinux mode is permissive, meaning that violations are logged but not enforced. See SELinux for details.

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Component Updates

  • Linux: 6.12.24
  • CNI plugins: 1.6.2
  • runc: 1.2.6
  • containerd: 2.0.5
  • etcd: 3.5.20
  • Flannel: 0.26.7
  • Kubernetes: 1.33.0
  • CoreDNS: 1.12.1
Talos is built with Go 1.24.2.

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Other Changes

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auditd

Disable Talos’ built-in auditd service using the kernel parameter talos.auditd.disabled=1.

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iSCSI Initiator

Talos now generates /etc/iscsi/initiatorname.iscsi based on node identity, ensuring a deterministic IQN. Update iSCSI targets to use the new IQN, which can be read with talosctl read /etc/iscsi/initiatorname.iscsi.

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NVMe NQN

Talos generates /etc/nvme/hostnqn and /etc/nvme/hostid based on node identity. The NQN can be read with talosctl read /etc/nvme/hostnqn.

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Ingress Firewall

The Ingress Firewall now correctly filters access to Kubernetes NodePort services.

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kube-apiserver Authorization Config

The .cluster.apiServer.authorizationConfig field now respects the user-defined order of authorizers. If Node and RBAC are not explicitly specified, they are appended to the end. Example: 
cluster:
  apiServer:
    authorizationConfig:
      - type: Node
        name: Node
      - type: Webhook
        name: Webhook
        webhook:
          connectionInfo:
            type: InClusterConfig
        ...
      - type: RBAC
        name: rbac
The authorization-mode CLI argument does not support this customization.

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Fully Bootstrapped Builds

Talos 1.10 is built using [Stageˣ], enhancing reproducibility, auditability, and security. The root filesystem now uses a unified /usr structure, with other directories symlinking to /usr/bin and /usr/lib. Third-party extensions must adjust their directories accordingly.