Google Cloud Update Version 2026-R21

May 27, 2026 Google Cloud release notes include App Engine bundled services preview controls, Cloud Composer tag and secret enhancements, GKE version updates, and multiple GA/preview feature additions across Gemini Enterprise, Looker, Spanner, and Vertex AI Search.

• App Engine standard environment now lets you enable only needed legacy bundled services with the app_engine_bundled_services field to improve security and reduce exposure.
• Looker adds Git CLI security sandboxing for SSH-connected projects; on supported instances this restricts accessible directories and executables during Git worktree operations.
• Looker no longer allows admins to create or manage API credentials for individual standard users in Looker (original); users manage their own keys, and API keys are hidden from admins while sudoing.
• Google Distributed Cloud for VMware and bare metal 1.34.500-gke.108 include vulnerability fixes.
• GKE release 2026-R21 includes updated Container-Optimized OS images with cumulative security fixes.

• Cloud Composer fixed Airflow UI log filtering so INFO-level messages display correctly in Airflow 3.
• Google Cloud Contact Center as a Service fixed multiple dashboard reporting issues, including mismatched CSAT scores, incorrect queue interaction totals, wrong chat display, placeholder Chat ID filters, export row limits, and incorrect abandon-time reporting.
• Google Distributed Cloud for VMware fixed installer and cluster provisioning issues involving vsphere-ca-certificate, k8s-health-check, and gkectl diagnose on standard user clusters.
• Google Distributed Cloud for bare metal fixed control plane bootstrap, certificate rotation, etcd encryption, and cluster recreation issues that could cause API flapping, transient disruptions, or stalled provisioning.

• Cloud Composer now supports Google Cloud tags for environments.
• Cloud Composer Gen 3 can create Kubernetes Secrets of type kubernetes.io/dockerconfigjson through the beta API.
• Compute Engine generally available C4A bare metal machine types: c4a-standard-96-metal and c4a-highmem-96-metal.
• Gemini Enterprise now has a GA Slack data store for searching and acting on Slack content.
• Looker 26.8 begins rolling out with GA CI, Conversational Analytics query support in Development Mode, tabbed dashboard enhancements, Snowflake self-service Explores, and several preview AI and dashboard features.
• Spanner Graph adds preview graph algorithms for fraud detection, entity resolution, and recommendations.
• Vertex AI Search layout parser image and table annotations are GA.

• Cloud Composer Gen 3 now supports kubernetes.io/dockerconfigjson secrets only through the beta Cloud Composer API; Opaque remains the default secret type.
• Cloud Composer introduced new Managed Airflow builds for Gen 3 and new images for Gen 2, and several older builds reached end of support.
• Google Distributed Cloud releases 1.34.500-gke.108 run on Kubernetes v1.34.7-gke.200.
• Google Distributed Cloud versions may take 7 to 14 days to appear in GKE On-Prem API clients such as the console, gcloud, and Terraform.
• GKE channel version rollouts can take multiple days, and some versions may not yet be available in all zones.
• Looker customer-hosted instances need the proot package to opt in to Git CLI sandboxing for SSH connections.
• Looker admins must enable specific Preview settings to use several new Looker features, including granular dashboard sizing, Conversational Analytics observability, agentic workflows, dashboard agents, and publishing to Gemini Enterprise.
• Looker API key management for standard users has moved to self-service on the user Account page.

Product Information

Vendor: Google

Product: Cloud

Version: 2026-R21

Release date: May 27, 2026