podman-desktop-hero-1.20

Podman Desktop 1.20 is now available. Click here to download it!

This release brings exciting new features and improvements:


Release details 🔍

Bulk Start All Containers

If you have several containers to run, you no longer need to start each one individually. Podman Desktop now provides a “Run All” button on the Containers view to launch all selected containers with a single click. This makes it much more convenient to bring up multiple services or an entire application stack in one go. Already-running containers are intelligently skipped, so the bulk start action focuses on only starting the ones that are stopped.

Containers List page

Switch Users and Clusters

Podman Desktop’s Kubernetes integration now supports easy context switching between different clusters and user accounts. You can change your active Kubernetes cluster and user directly through the application UI without editing config files or using external CLI commands. This is especially useful for developers working with multiple environments – for example, switching from a development cluster to a production cluster (or using different user credentials) is now just a few clicks. It streamlines multi-cluster workflows by letting you hop between contexts seamlessly inside Podman Desktop.

Edit Kubernetes Context page

Extension Search by Description

The extension marketplace search has been improved to help you discover tools more easily. Previously, searching for extensions only matched against extension names. In Podman Desktop 1.20, the search bar also looks at extension descriptions. This means you can enter a keyword related to an extension’s functionality or topic, and the relevant extensions will appear even if that keyword isn’t in the extension’s name. It’s now much easier to find extensions by what they do, not just what they’re called.

Extensions page

Provider Updates from Resources Page

Managing your container and Kubernetes providers just got easier. The Resources page in Podman Desktop (which lists your container engines and Kubernetes environments) now allows direct updates for those providers. If a new version of a provider – say Podman, Docker, or a Kubernetes VM – is available, you can trigger the upgrade right from Podman Desktop’s interface. No need to manually run update commands or leave the app; a quick click keeps your development environment up-to-date with the latest releases.

Resources page

Local Extension Development Mode

Extension authors can now toggle Development Mode in Preferences and add a local folder from the new Local Extensions tab. Podman Desktop will watch the folder, load the extension, and keep it tracked across restarts, exactly as it behaves in production. You can start, stop, or untrack the extension directly from the UI, shortening the feedback loop for building and debugging add-ons without extra CLI flags or a special dev build.

Resources page

Instantly stop live container logs

The container logs viewer can now be canceled mid-stream, allowing you to stop tailing logs when they are no longer needed. Previously, once a container’s logs were opened, the output would continue streaming until the logs window was closed. With this update, an ongoing log stream can be interrupted via a cancel action without closing the logs pane, giving you more control over log monitoring. This improvement helps avoid redundant log output and unnecessary resource usage by letting log streaming be halted on demand.

New Community Page

We’ve launched a new Community page on the Podman Desktop website to better connect our users and contributors. This page serves as a central hub for all community-related resources: you can find links to join our Discord channel, participate in GitHub discussions, follow us on social platforms, and more. It also highlights ways to contribute to the project, whether by reporting issues, writing code, or improving documentation. Whether you want to share feedback, meet other Podman Desktop enthusiasts, or get involved in development, the Community page is the place to start.


Community thank you

🎉 We’d like to say a big thank you to everyone who helped to make Podman Desktop even better. In this release we received pull requests from the following people:


Final notes

The complete list of issues fixed in this release is available here and here.

Get the latest release from the Downloads section of the website and boost your development journey with Podman Desktop. Additionally, visit the GitHub repository and see how you can help us make Podman Desktop better.

Detailed release changelog

feat 💡

fix 🔨

chore ✅

refactor 🛠️

test 🚦

docs 📖

ci 🔁