Drupal 12 had a date circled on the calendar for the week of August 10. That week came and went like an ex who texts "we should catch up sometime" and then goes dark — except this time, the project was refreshingly upfront about the ghosting.

The Release That Moved, On Purpose

Drupal's core team has confirmed that Drupal 12.0.0 has slipped from its August target to the week of December 7, 2026, releasing alongside Drupal 11.5.0. Drupal 12.0.0-beta1 is now scheduled for the week of September 14, with release candidates following the week of November 9.

The holdup wasn't drama — it was a punch list. Seven release-critical items, including PHPUnit 12 support, a new JavaScript import maps API, updated database dumps, removal of the legacy Toolbar module, and stabilizing the Gin admin theme, weren't going to be finished in time for the earlier window, so the team pushed the date instead of shipping something half-baked.

Why "Late but Honest" Beats "On Time but Broken"

Drupal runs three release windows a year specifically so a missed date doesn't turn into a fire drill — miss August, and December is right there waiting, with no pressure to cut corners on things like deprecated-module removal or an admin theme everyone's about to inherit by default.

For agencies and site owners planning a Drupal 11-to-12 migration, this delay is good news wearing a disguise: more runway to test, more time for contributed modules to catch up, and a beta that's actually feature-complete instead of "mostly there, ship it."

A release date is a promise; Drupal just chose to keep the promise that actually matters — shipping something solid — over the one on the calendar.

Planning a Drupal 11 to 12 migration and want a second set of eyes on your module compatibility before beta lands? Let's talk.

Source: Drupal.org