GCP Release Notes: January 06, 2026

BigQuery

Feature

The CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE and LOAD DATA statements now support the following options:

• time_zone: specify a time zone to use when loading data
• date_format, datetime_format, time_format, and timestamp_format: define how date and time values are formatted in your source files
• null_markers: define the strings that represent NULL values in CSV files.
• source_column_match: specify how loaded columns are matched to the schema. You can match columns by position or by name.

These features are generally available (GA).

Cloud Run functions

Feature

You can now configure Direct VPC egress for 2nd gen functions. This support is at the Preview release level.

Dataproc

Change

Removed use of deprecated Hadoop configuration properties fs.default.name and yarn.resourcemanager.system-metrics-publisher.enabled.

Fixed

Fixed the spark.driver.extraClassPath delimiter for the Jupyter SparkMonitor Listener.

Feature

Added a new property dataproc:pypi.repository to customize the PyPI repository used for pip. The value can be a URL, or google to use a Google-hosted cache of PyPI, accessible without public internet connectivity. Starting in image version 3.1, google will be the default; to opt out and return to public PyPI, use the value pypi.

Announcement

New Dataproc on Compute Engine subminor image versions:

• 2.0.156-debian10, 2.0.156-ubuntu18, 2.0.156-rocky8
• 2.1.105-debian11, 2.1.105-ubuntu20, 2.1.105-ubuntu20-arm, 2.1.105-rocky8
• 2.2.73-debian12, 2.2.73-ubuntu22, 2.2.73-ubuntu22-arm, 2.2.73-rocky9
• 2.3.20-debian12, 2.3.20-ml-ubuntu22, 2.3.20-rocky9, 2.3.20-ubuntu22, 2.3.20-ubuntu22-arm

Generative AI on Vertex AI

Feature

GLM 4.7 is available as an experimental launch in Model Garden. This model is designed for core or vibe coding, tool use, and complex reasoning. GLM 4.7 is available as a managed API in Model Garden. To learn more, see GLM 4.7.

Google Cloud VMware Engine

Feature

VMware Engine introduces enhancements to simplify using external NFS datastores. External NFS datastores let you scale storage independently of compute resources for your VMware workloads. You can use Filestore or Google Cloud NetApp Volumes as external NFS datastores for ESXi hosts in Google Cloud VMware Engine. For more information, see NFS datastores overview.

Google Kubernetes Engine

Fixed

A fix is available for the December 16, 2025 issue in which Autopilot nodes enter into a state where new system Pods and user Pods are unable to run due to NRI RunPodSandbox failures. For more details, including instructions on how to confirm if you’re affected by this, see Pods unable to run on a Node due to NRI RunPodSandbox failed.

The fix is available with GKE version 1.34.1-gke.3899000 and later.

Source: Google Cloud Platform