Release stages
Tailscale’s features can go through multiple release stages: Alpha, Beta, and General Availability (GA).
Release stages
Alpha
The feature is available for testing. Alpha releases may be public or private. The feature may have changing requirements and scope, and needs feedback. Alpha releases are not necessarily feature complete, may not work on all platforms, may not have full functionality in the UI, CLI, or API, and may not be documented. Alpha releases have no technical support obligations.
Beta
The feature is publicly available for testing environments. The feature needs refinement and broader testing to know it meets users’ needs. Beta releases are documented, including any known gaps in functionality or platform support. Beta releases have no technical support obligations.
General availability (GA)
The feature is publicly available, and ready for production use. Technical support obligations apply to GA features.
Comparison matrix
| Alpha | Beta | GA | |
| Availability | May be public or private | Public | Public |
| Breaking changes | Yes | Yes, but with some warning | No |
| Known issues | Major | Minor | Bugs |
| Platform support | May only work on one platform | May only work on one or a few platforms, or have significant issues on some platforms | Works on all intended platforms |
| UI/CLI/API support | May have limited UX | May have limited UX | Works in all intended UX |
| Documentation | Not publicly, or very limited | Yes, but may be incomplete | Yes |
| Terms of Service | Covered under existing Terms of Service | Covered under existing Terms of Service | Covered under existing Terms of Service |
| On by default | No | May be for new tailnets | May be for new and existing tailnets |
Experimental
Sometimes we publish experimental projects that aren’t even at an alpha stage yet. These experiments are not official features, might not be fully functional, and don’t have any technical support.
We like to develop in the open in order to get feedback, and so will often do these experiments in public repositories. They will typically be in a standalone repository, separated from the main Tailscale client code, or disabled by a feature flag.