Member-only story
Node.js has released v26!
Time travel, a new version of V8, and the latest version of undici. Some surprisingly removed features too.
I have just upgraded a side-project to Node.js 26. I broke two things before I could even have my coffee.
If you’re running a full-stack JS project then you need to take note of this release. Here’s what I found out to save you some debugging.
Changes
Node.js 26.0.0 was released on the 5th of May 2026. This version comes with Temporal turned on by default, an upgrade to V8 version 14.6, and an upgrade to Undici version 8.0. Here are the changes that will affect backend developers.
Temporal is now on by default
Temporal is a modern date/time API which replaces the legacy Date object. If you've ever had issues with timezones in JS you'll know why this is important. No need to add polyfills for new projects.
// Temporal is available globally in Node.js 26
const start = Temporal.ZonedDateTime.from('2026-11-01T09:00[Asia/Kolkata]');
// Add 30 days to our date (won't mutate the original object unlike Date)
const deadline = start.add({ days: 30 });
console.log(deadline.toString())
// Handles DST and time zone rules for us
