Umbraco has released the latest long-term supported version of its open-source .NET content management system, Umbraco 17. The platform is used by organisations including Carlsberg Group, Thames Water, Baker Tilly, Rubbermaid, and several public sector bodies such as The Council of the European Union.
Load balancing
Umbraco 17 introduces the ability for organisations to use load balancing in both the website front end and the back office. This supports the simultaneous work of several content editors across large or complex websites.
"One of the features that I'm most excited about is load balancing. Starting with Umbraco 17, users can now load balance their Umbraco projects, including the back office. This will be a game-changer for enterprises that need to have several content editors working on their website at the same time," said Filip Bech Larsen, Chief Technology Officer, Umbraco.
Search provider choice
The platform also provides enhanced search capabilities, allowing customers to use their preferred search provider. This is expected to help organisations seeking to offer advanced and semantic search options for users exploring large digital estates containing information, documents, or products.
"Where our digital agency partners are being asked to include semantic search in customers' sites, Umbraco 17 will enable them to plug in abstractions that deliver those capabilities," said Larsen.
Upgrade pathway
Organisations using Umbraco 13, the previous long-term-supported version, can upgrade to Umbraco 17 via a direct upgrade path. Existing features have been retained, including headless support for decoupled content delivery and webhooks to support integration and extend site functionality.
"Organisations that have built projects on Umbraco 13, our previous LTS version, will have a direct upgrade path to Umbraco 17," adds Bolette Kern, Senior Product Manager, Umbraco.
"Organisations upgrading to Umbraco 17 LTS will also benefit from the new backoffice architecture, extensibility, security, headless capabilities, scalability, and performance enhancements brought into the core CMS over the past two years," says Kern.
Platform alignment
Umbraco 17 has been developed to run on Microsoft's .NET 10 framework, which is itself a long-term supported version. This ensures that customer projects on Umbraco 17 will receive support for at least 3 years, with ongoing optimisations included in the underlying software platform.
Kern notes, "Being on the latest .NET version ensures that any optimisations and improvements incorporated into .NET 10 are also reflected in Umbraco 17. Both are LTS versions, which means that your Umbraco 17 projects will be future-proofed for at least three years."
Customisation focus
Customisation features remain central to the development strategy, with additional extension points included in this release. These enable organisations and agencies to tailor the CMS to specific needs and ensure customisations are robust and supported throughout the platform lifecycle.
"We are committed to our CMS platform strategy of providing an extendable, future-proof foundation that grows and scales with your organisation. Umbraco takes a unique extension-first approach, where customisation is a first-class citizen. Umbraco 17 strengthens this aspect with even more extension points that are registered, documented, and supported, to ensure that organisations' customisations are robust," said Larsen.
Additional features
The release incorporates HybridCache for efficient content loading and multi-site management capabilities first introduced in earlier versions. Organisations with requirements for localised content benefit from block-level variations, while role-based permissions help with access management. The core text editor now uses TipTap, an open-source rich text editor, instead of TinyMCE, offering improved content editing and out-of-the-box licensing compliance.
