The ACRN v3.0 release offers a major developer experience update including a new Configurator UI simplifying setup for the hypervisor and VMs, adds additional supported hardware for industrial use cases, Debian packaging, and new features and enhancements.
Read our updated Hardware and Software roadmap showing what’s been happening with the ACRN hypervisor so far this year and what’s in the support plans for the rest of 2022.
It’s hard to believe the Project ACRN Hypervisor was announced at the US Embedded Linux Conference three years ago, March 15, 2018. Here’s a summary of key milestones over these last three years, including the most recent merging of ACRN patch sets into the Linux 5.12 kernel. Congratulations to the ACRN community, and Happy Birthday!
ACRN v2.7 updates API terminology and scenario names, introduces user-friendly VM names, extends VM use of cache allocation (CAT) tuning, and expands passthrough device use cases.
ACRN v2.6 improves performance of nested virtualization (running a VM inside a guest VM), adds support for loading an OS in ELF format, and has major improvements to the introductory ACRN documentation.
ACRN v2.5 introduces a new technology preview for nested virtualization (running a VM inside a guest VM), using an EFI stub as an alternative for end-to-end secure boot, scalability improvements through modularization, and continued improvements to the configuration and build process.
Presentation recordings from the 2021 European ACRN Virtual Meet-up are now available, wrapping up a successful get together with ACRN engineers and community developers!

The ACRN team is hosting a free two-day virtual Meet-Up, brought to you by Intel. Please join us 25-26 May, to learn more about ACRN, how far it has come over the last three years, and where it is headed. The Meet-Up is intended for developers with a technical profile and interest in hypervisor solutions, but no prior knowledge of ACRN is required.
Date: Tuesday, 25th of May, 2021
Time: 9AM to 1PM (Central European Time)
9:00AM | Welcome |
9:10AM | ACRN Introduction and Architecture |
9:50 AM | Real-Time Management and Performance Optimization |
10:30 AM | Functional Safety Design and Certification Plan |
11:10 AM | Break |
11:30 AM | Installation and Configuration Introduction |
12:10 PM | Enabling ACRN on New Hardware Platforms |
12:50 PM | Conclusions |
1:00 PM | End |
Date: Wednesday, 26th of May, 2021
Time: 9AM to 1PM (Central European Time)
9:00AM | Welcome |
9:10 AM | Orchestration with Libvirt and Kata Container |
9:50 AM | Boot Process and Secure Boot |
10:30 AM | Community & Development Model |
11:10 AM | Break |
11:30 AM | Debugging ACRN (Tracing & Logging) |
12:10 PM | Inter-VM Communication Introduction |
12:50 PM | Conclusions |
1:00 PM | End |
Here’s the link to register and get an invitation to attend. We hope to see you there!
We are pleased to announce the release of ACRN™ hypervisor version 2.4.
What’s New in v2.4
Extensive work was done to redesign how ACRN configuration is handled, update the build process to use the new configuration system, and update the corresponding documentation. This is a significant change and improvement to how you configure ACRN but also impacts existing projects, as explained in the next section.
We’ve also validated the hybrid_rt scenario on the next generation of Intel® Core™ processors (codenamed Elkhart Lake) and enabled software SRAM and cache locking for real-time performance on Elkhart Lake.
See the v2.4 full release notes and documentation for more information about this release including fixed and known issues.
The ACRN hypervisor added libvirt and Kata to its latest offering, enabling a myriad of orchestration software stacks in the cloud and IoT space, meeting the demand of edge computing and smart factory mixed and critical workloads.