Kiali releases 2.16 to 2.30: Features update

Hello Kiali community!

It has been an extraordinary sequence of 15 releases! From Kiali v2.16 through v2.30, the team has delivered major infrastructure, visual, observability, and AI milestones.

Whether you are running Kiali standalone, integrated into OpenShift Service Mesh Console (OSSMC), or managing enterprise Ambient meshes across multi-cluster environments, this cycle brings massive upgrades.

Get Hayk Hovsepyan’s stories in your inbox

Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.

Remember me for faster sign in

If you missed any of our live bi-weekly sprint demos, catch up on our recorded sessions on the Kiali YouTube Channel. Below is breakdown of major features introduced across these 15 releases!

1. AI Assistant & MCP Integration 🤖

Artificial Intelligence and Model Context Protocol (MCP) integrations were a central focus during past releases:

• Kiali AI Chatbot Widget & Streaming (SSE): Built-in chat drawer with support for OpenAI and Google Gemini providers, including Server-Sent Events (SSE) streaming for real-time responses, tool execution UI indicators, and multi-cluster awareness.
• Kiali MCP Server (Dev Preview & Ambient Tools): We introduced Kiali’s Model Context Protocol (MCP) server integration (containers/kubernetes-mcp-server & openshift/openshift-mcp-server), allowing AI tools to retrieve Istio configs, cluster resources, mesh status, logs, metrics, and traces. In v2.28–v2.29, we added analyze_ambient_policies to expose L4/L7 policy details, ztunnel status, waypoint proxy data, and Ambient traffic graphs to LLM agents.

2. UX & PatternFly 6 Migration 🎨

We executed a major modernization of Kiali’s user interface and frontend tooling:

• PatternFly 6 (PF6) Migration (v2.20–v2.21): Refreshed Kiali’s visual layout with PatternFly 6 patterns, introducing a new Notification Center, modernized Masthead status icons, updated Traffic Shifting Wizards (easier request mirroring), and upgraded PF Select dropdowns.

• Redesigned Overview & Namespaces Pages (v2.23): Overhauled the main Overview page into a compact, card-based dashboard for instant health summaries. The multi-cluster namespace list was split into a dedicated Namespaces Page equipped with sorting, filtering, and mTLS indicators.

Namespaces List page

Overview page

Namespace Details page

• Manage Columns Modal (v2.28): Added column customization (show, hide, and reorder) to the Applications, Services, and Workloads list pages in both standalone Kiali and OSSMC plugins.

• Detail Pages UX Redesign (v2.27): Updated Overview tabs for Applications, Services, and Workloads with clearer card layouts, easier label/annotation editing, and simplified pod cards.

• Monaco Editor for Istio Configs (v2.29): Replaced the legacy react-ace editor with Monaco Editor. Side panels now group validation warnings inline, pin references to the top, and eliminate redundant info cards.

3. Istio Ambient Mesh & K8s Gateway API 🌐

Kiali extended its visual diagnostics for sidecarless Istio Ambient Mode and modern ingress standards:

• Ambient Validation Rules: Introduced new validation rules (KIA1211 and KIA1212) for ServiceEntries sharing host/port combinations with conflicting protocols, while fixing false positives for HTTPRoutes enrolled in Ambient meshes (KIA1401).

• Kubernetes Gateway API v1.4 & v1.5 Extension Support: Updated CRD validation and detail visualizers to support Gateway API v1.4.0, v1.5.0, and Gateway API Inference Extensions v1 (used for AI model serving routes).

4. Scalability, Performance & Local Execution ⚡

To support enterprise clusters managing thousands of workloads, several backend engine optimizations were introduced:

• Health Precompute Engine (v2.22): Added a background process to continuously compute and cache health metrics for Applications, Services, and Workloads, allowing summary list pages to load instantly without waiting for on-demand math.
• Traffic Graph Caching & Fast Refresh (v2.21): Implemented per-session graph caching with background auto-refreshes and a 10-minute session memory window when navigating away and returning to the graph.

• Graph Appender Performance Optimizations (v2.16): Optimized the “Istio Appender” decorating logic (which attaches VirtualServices and Gateways to graph nodes), with an option to skip VirtualService decoration for massive speedups.

• Kiali Local & Offline Modes (v2.17): Enabled running Kiali locally on a developer laptop directly against a kubeconfig without installing the server in-cluster, as well as loading must-gather bundles in Offline Mode for offline debugging.

• SPIRE Identity Support (v2.22): Integrated SPIRE workload identity metadata into detail cards across Workloads, Applications, and Services.

5. Tracing, Observability & Security Hardening 🔐

• Tempo & Perses Integrations: Added support for OpenShift URL formatting (url_format: 'openshift') for Tempo traces and Perses dashboards, along with automatic path autocompletion for multi-tenant Tempo setups.

• NetObserv Integration (OSSMC v2.18): Added a dedicated Network Traffic (NT) badge on graph nodes, linking OpenShift Service Mesh Console users directly to NetObserv flow views inside OpenShift.

• Added OpenID Authorization Code Flow with PKCE for single sign-on (SSO) and custom OIDC endpoints.
• Enforced OpenShift TLSSecurityProfile standards and added configurable TLS curve groups (including FIPS-safe PQC key exchange support).
• Internationalization (i18n): Added frontend i18n support, including Spanish, Chinese, and community-contributed Korean localization.

Community Shoutouts & Thank You! 🙏

A massive thank you to all our maintainers, Red Hat team members, and open-source community contributors who made these 15 releases possible!

Remember that Kiali is OpenSource and you can contribute to build a better project! It would be nice if you also contribute with written content in Kiali’s Medium publication!