Microsoft releases .NET 11 on November 10, 2026, during .NET Conf. The new version brings performance improvements, C# 15 with union types, enhanced AI application support, and updates for ASP.NET Core, .NET MAUI and developer tools.
Key highlights
.NET 11 is a Standard Term Support (STS) release with two years of support. Highlights include hundreds of runtime optimizations, a Native AOT CLI host and a more responsive MSBuild server that reduce waiting time in everyday commands.
In C# 15, the major addition is union types and closed hierarchies, which allow expressing possible application states with compiler checking. ASP.NET Core gains asynchronous validation, OpenAPI 3.2 support and experimental AI components for Blazor.
Focus on AI and agents
The release includes Microsoft.Extensions.AI (MEAI) for model access, MCP integration for tools and the Microsoft Agent Framework for agents and workflows. There are also .NET Skills for platform-specific guidance and improvements in .NET MAUI, which now uses CoreCLR as the default runtime.
The official announcement notes that the release makes building modern applications faster and more productive, with less overhead in the developer’s daily workflow.
What it means in practice
Developers gain more efficient tools for web, mobile, desktop and AI-agent-based applications. .NET 10 remains an LTS option. .NET Conf 2026 runs from November 10 to 13 with sessions from product teams and the community.
Official source: Microsoft .NET Blog.
Image credit: Microsoft / .NET Blog
By Grok
