Release Notes for Smart Karpenter Version 1.2.0

Release Date: 5th December 2025

Smart Karpenter provides advanced autoscaling designed for modern applications, automating application and infrastructure scaling with accuracy. It offers the fastest path to optimizing Kubernetes performance, lowering cloud costs, and eliminating DevOps scaling challenges.

We continue to add new features and enhancements to Smart Karpenter.

What's New 🔈

Core Karpenter Version Upgraded to 1.8.0

We have upgraded the core Karpenter version to 1.8.0. This version upgrade provides the following benefits:

• Prevention of resource leaks and unexpected cloud costs

• Improved cluster hygiene

• Reduced number of manual cleanup operations

• Dual-strategy instance listing with automatic fallback for optimal performance. This helps in providing better scalability for large clusters.

• Automatic discovery of Oracle Kubernetes Engine (OKE) images matching the cluster's Kubernetes version. This automatic discovery:

  • Reduces manual configuration
  • Ensures version compatibility
  • Simplifies cluster upgrades
  • Provides better observability (logs show image source)

Node Rotation in OCI

Smart Karpenter on OCI now supports the following rotation types:

• Graceful Time-Based Node Rotation Smart Karpenter now supports automatic, scheduled node rotation using TTLs and maintenance windows. Nodes are replaced gracefully with zero downtime and full PDB awareness.

  For more information, see Graceful Node Rotation.

• Manual Node Rotation Admins can now trigger on-demand node refresh by marking nodes for drift or disruption. Smart Karpenter provisions replacement capacity and safely drains old nodes.

  For more information, see Manual Node Rotation.

Automatic Kubernetes Version Detection on OCI

Smart Karpenter automatically detects the Kubernetes version from the OKE control plane and selects the appropriate node image, ensuring consistent and compatible node provisioning without manual intervention.

For more information, see Automatic Kubernetes Version Detection on OCI.

What's Improved 🔈

Enhanced Disruption Budgets for Node Rotation on OCI

New disruption budget controls let you define how many nodes can rotate at once—by percentage, count, reason, or schedule—ensuring safe and predictable rollouts.

For more information, see Disruption Budgets.