The third release candidate for Qubes 4.1 is here! There are no major changes to report. We’ve just focused on fixing bugs that were discovered and reported in the second release candidate.

If you’re currently using any Qubes 4.1 release candidate, a regular update is sufficient to upgrade to the latest one. Otherwise, read on for more about how to get started with testing Qubes 4.1-rc3.

What’s new in Qubes 4.1?

In case you still haven’t heard, Qubes 4.1 includes several major new features, each of which is explained in depth in its own article:

There are also numerous other improvements and bug fixes listed in the release notes and in the issue tracker.

Finally, Qubes 4.1 features the following updated default components:

  • Xen 4.14
  • Fedora 32 in dom0
  • Fedora 34 template
  • Debian 11 template
  • Whonix 16 Gateway and Workstation templates
  • Linux kernel 5.10

How to test Qubes 4.1-rc3

If you’re willing to test this release candidate, you can help to improve the stable release by reporting any bugs you encounter. Experienced users are strongly encouraged to join the testing team!

How to migrate to 4.1-rc3:

  • If you’re already on any 4.1 release candidate, simply perform a normal update.
  • If you’re not on a 4.1 release candidate yet, you have two options:
    1. Back up your current installation, download 4.1-rc3, perform a fresh install, then restore from your backup.
    2. Perform an in-place upgrade.

Release candidate planning

With each new release candidate, Qubes 4.1 becomes more and more stable as our testers report more bugs, and our developers fix them. As explained in our general release schedule, this cycle will continue until no major bugs are discovered, at which point the last release candidate will be declared the stable 4.1 release. Until then, we plan to have new release candidates approximately every five weeks.