Node.js 26 Arrives April 22 as the Last Release Under the Old Odd/Even Model
Node.js 26 ships April 22 as the final release under the project's long-running odd/even cadence, with the Temporal API on track and a new annual LTS-for-all model beginning with Node.js 27.
Overview
Node.js 26 is scheduled to release on April 22, 2026 — two days from now — carrying more symbolic weight than most version bumps. It is the last major release under the project’s decades-old odd/even cadence: a model where only even-numbered versions (v22, v24, v26) ever became Long-Term Support candidates, and odd-numbered siblings (v23, v25) went largely ignored by the enterprise world.
Starting with Node.js 27, the project will ship one major version per year, and every release will receive LTS status. The change ends a source of longstanding confusion and maintainer strain, and lands at a moment when the project’s security funding has also quietly dried up.
The End of the Odd/Even Model
Node.js has operated on a biennial LTS rhythm since the early days of the OpenJS Foundation. Even-numbered releases arrived in April and entered LTS in October; odd-numbered releases served as short-lived testing grounds that few production environments ever adopted. The model was practical when it was designed, but its rationale has eroded.
As the Node.js Release Working Group explained in its official announcement, odd-numbered releases see “minimal adoption,” the even/odd distinction “confuses newer users,” and the burden of backporting security fixes across multiple concurrent active release lines has become unsustainable for the project’s volunteer maintainers. One core contributor is quoted as noting that the original cadence “was based entirely on corporate adoption cycles that were relevant at that time.”
Node.js 26 releases April 22, enters LTS in October 2026, enters maintenance in October 2027, and reaches end of life in April 2029 — the standard lifecycle. It is, as the working group’s GitHub issue for the release notes, the last release line following this model.
What Comes Next: Node.js 27 and Annual Releases
Beginning with Node.js 27, the cadence changes fundamentally. According to the official release schedule announcement, the new model works as follows:
- One major release per year, in April
- LTS promotion in October for every release — no exceptions
- A new six-month alpha channel running October through March, replacing the exploratory role that odd-numbered releases once played
Alpha releases will use version strings like 27.0.0-alpha.1, will allow semver-major API changes, and are aimed at library authors and CI pipelines — not production deployments. The overall support window of 36 months (Current through LTS to EOL) remains the same.
The practical result for developers who only ever run LTS: predictable April upgrades, and eventually version numbers that align roughly with calendar years. Node.js 27 enters alpha in October 2026, releases April 2027, and becomes LTS in October 2027.
Temporal API on Track for Node.js 26
The most anticipated technical addition for Node.js 26 is the Temporal API, JavaScript’s long-overdue successor to the notoriously flawed Date object. According to Node Weekly’s April 16 issue, the TC39 proposal reached Stage 4 last month, and the Node.js team had been waiting on V8 to enable it by default — which occurred in V8 14.4, clearing the path for inclusion in Node 26.
The Temporal API replaces mutable, timezone-confused Date objects with an immutable hierarchy of types: Temporal.Instant for machine-precision timestamps, Temporal.ZonedDateTime for timezone-aware date-times, and Temporal.PlainDate/PlainTime for cases where timezone information is deliberately absent. As documented by Bryntum’s cross-browser tracking, Firefox enabled Temporal by default in version 139 (May 2025) and Chrome followed in version 144 (January 2026).
Node.js 24.15.0 LTS, released April 15, also backported several features from v25 — including stable require(esm) support, the module compile cache, and the --max-heap-size flag — laying the groundwork Node.js 26 builds on.
Security Bounty Program Suspended
On the same week Node.js 26 prepares to ship, the project’s security bounty program has gone dark. The Node.js project announced in April 2026 that it is pausing financial rewards for vulnerability reports after the Internet Bug Bounty (IBB) program — its funding source since 2016 — stopped accepting new submissions on March 27.
The IBB’s pause is itself a product of AI. As Slashdot’s coverage of the announcement explains, HackerOne determined that AI-assisted research had accelerated vulnerability discovery far faster than open source maintainers can fix underlying problems. The program had historically allocated 80% of funds to new bug discovery and 20% to remediation — a balance now untenable when AI tools can generate reports faster than humans can triage them.
Vulnerability reports to Node.js through HackerOne remain open, and the security team will continue fixing issues. But without financial incentives, researchers who depend on bounty income may submit fewer reports. Node.js has indicated it will explore reinstating a program if dedicated funding becomes available through the OpenJS Foundation.
What to Watch
For most Node.js users, v26 is primarily an upgrade target: a new LTS candidate that replaces v24 (which enters maintenance in October 2026). Whether the Temporal API ships enabled by default — rather than behind a flag — will be the main technical question to watch in the release notes on April 22.
The structural story matters more in the long run. When Node.js 27 arrives in April 2027, it will be the first version in the project’s history that every developer — LTS-conservative enterprise teams and bleeding-edge experimenters alike — can treat as a production-ready target from day one.