Umbraco update: Umbraco 17 released, a new enterprise offering and more

2026 has only just begun, but it already looks like its going to be another super-busy year at Umbraco HQ. The vendor made a number of announcements in the last few weeks of 2025, including the final, full release of Umbraco 17, the latest long-term supported version of the platform.

In this post we walk you through the main points of the recent flurry of Umbraco updates and what they mean for Umbraco users in 2026.

1. Umbraco 17 released with a focus on stability

We have already covered on the blog about how Umbraco 17 is a major release, being a long-term supported (LTS) version. It has also seen a new release approach with a new “Beta” phase. However, the final release is now here.

A key emphasis for Umbraco 17 is stability. It is built on .NET 10 which provides a strong and trusted foundation for the platform, sending the right message to IT functions in larger enterprises. It also brings improved performance.

Another feature supporting stability is the introduction of load balancing for the backoffice which avoids potential performance issues which could occur – for example for larger editorial teams – and overall provides greater resilience.

There are also another couple of welcome additions:

• The introduction of consistent date handling (UTC which is the same as GMT) across the environment making it easier to schedule content, compare activity logs and avoiding issues when moving content across servers or regions.
• A number of accessibility improvements to the backoffice.

All these add up to a package of changes which will tick the box for larger organisations, better meeting expectations about what is required of an enterprise-ready CMS.

2. Enhancements to Umbraco Cloud

The new release of Umbraco 17 also brings a number of welcome changes and enhancements to the Umbraco Cloud offering. The big news is that Umbraco 17 is available within Umbraco Cloud from day one which has not always been the case with previous releases. This brings a number of new capabilities including a new iteration of CI/CD (Continuous Improvement/ Continuous Delivery) for smoother and faster deployments, a number of features to reduce risk, a Custom Identity Provider facility to allow central authentication (such as Microsoft Entra ID) to Umbraco and more.

However, load balancing in Umbraco Cloud is still not available, although it is being worked upon with a date to still be confirmed.

3. Changes to Umbraco add-ons

The release also brings enhancements to the various Umbraco “add-ons” such as Umbraco Engage and Umbraco Commerce:

• Umbraco Engage (formerly known as UMarketingSuite) is now “fully aligned” with the revamped backoffice.
• Engage also now works with Umbraco Deploy, which means you can achieve easier deployments by moving your Engage configuration between environments, as long as it is the same version of Umbraco. However, analytics and related engagement data are not transferred as these are unique to each environment.
• Umbraco Commerce is also aligned with Umbraco 17, giving it a more stable foundation. The same also applies to Umbraco UI Builder.
• There is a new licensing model for Umbraco Forms and only this is now available for Umbraco 17. Using Forms with Umbraco 17 requires migration to the new model, but Umbraco offer an easy path for this to happen.
• Umbraco Workflow now has support for “release sets” which allow multiple content items to be published all at once. Related processes such as reviewing and approving are also supported. Umbraco Workflow also now has more granular permissions.

Overall, it is good to see Umbraco ensuring that the add-ons are aligned with Umbraco 17 from day one.

4. New Umbraco for Enterprise offering

A major trend for Umbraco – reflected in releases like 17 – is the ability to better serve enterprise customers and give them confidence that Umbraco provides the long-term focus, the feature set and the scalability to support complex, large enterprise projects. This has now been encapsulated in a new “Umbraco for Enterprise” offering that packages up all the Umbraco suite of products and add-ons, comprehensive support, GDPR compliance and upcoming ISO 27001 certification, and a dedicated Customer Success Manager, all covered by one agreement.

This is an intriguing and welcome step. We think some elements such as the ISO 27001 certification will make a tangible difference in ensuring Umbraco helps pass any necessary enterprise due diligence or IT checklist, enabling Umbraco to make it on to more RFP shortlists and ultimately get approval for enterprise projects. However, it will be a bit of a “watch this space” to see how it actually lands with enterprise customers during 2026.

5. Umbraco supports bring your own AI with the Umbraco Developer MCP

Umbraco has not been as “all in” on AI as some of its competitors and has deliberately chosen a strategy where there is less focus on in-built AI vendor features, and more on “bring your own AI”. In a recent blog piece Umbraco CTO Filip Bech Larsen reiterated Umbraco’s AI-agnostic strategy, saying “we strongly believe that the choice should be yours” and “AI can unlock your business, so don’t just hand the keys to your CMS vendor.”

This philosophy has been reflected in the release of the Umbraco MCP Server which enables developers to plug-in agents from the major LLMs and AI services using the Model Context Protocol into their Umbraco project. This was previously released in Umbraco 16, but with the release of Umbraco 17 now has full parity with the Umbraco Management API in terms of the entity types it covers. Future expansion of the MCP Server is also on the roadmap. An interesting addition, is the creation of a sustainable AI agent profile within Umbraco that helps establish a more sustainable approach for AI agents, reducing unnecessary token usage and more sustainable development practices.

6. Umbraco continues its regional expansion

As part of its continued expansion, Umbraco HQ has continued to establish a global presence by opening up offices in different markets. These provide more tangible on-the-ground support and focus for partners, developers, customers and prospects. For example, in 2025 Umbraco opened an office in Bristol to solidify its presence in the UK. Now Umbraco has announced an expansion into Australia and New Zealand with a new office which includes a new Head of APAC, a Sales Partner manager, and two roles to support customer success and technical enablement. While this won’t be significant news for 3chillies customers, we think it’s a positive step that shows that Umbraco wants to compete as a global player. It also means Umbraco can start to offer near 24-hour global support across time zones.

The new year with Umbraco

We can expect there to be a lot more to come from Umbraco during 2026 and we’ll do our best to keep you updated here on the blog.

If you have any questions about these new announcements or want to discuss your 2026 Umbraco project, then get in touch!