How to keep an overview of the Salesforce release cycle?

Question

I have problems keeping an overview of the Salesforce releases & its release dates (previous, current & upcoming).

I've found that if I go to https://www.salesforce.com, navigate to Support from the drop-down menu, open Help & Documentation, and click on Developer Documentation, the first tile redirects to an article containing the latest Salesforce release.

However, I can't find:

• An overview of all release notes and dates of all releases (previous, current, upcoming).
• The upcoming release notes & date.

I usually go and Google the next release date, and the results sometimes show links to Salesforce Blog articles, such as this one, but the thing is that:

• I don't want to have to search release-related info via Google.
• I don't want to take information from Salesforce Blog articles.

I've somehow been able to Google search a list of all existing release notes except the upcoming one for SFMC, which is very useful:

For Salesforce, I have only found the latest release notes, and it does not contain an overview of all Salesforce release notes & dates:

So, my questions are:

• Is there an overview of previous, latest and upcoming Salesforce releases, including the release dates?
• How to find the upcoming release notes & date without having to Google it & having to monitor Salesforce Blog?
• If the above is not possible, what's the best approach to keeping oriented in the release cycle?

Answer 1

Is there an overview of previous, latest and upcoming Salesforce releases, including the release dates?

For recent past Release Notes, you can see those in the Release Notes page using the dropdown in the upper-right corner. For all past Release Notes, see What's New in Salesforce?. This includes links, but no release dates. There's no real "summary" page for all the releases, though. The first available release notes was about 50 pages, but they're over 700 pages in the latest releases. Each release note is structured in a way that gives a high level overview by category, each category gives a summary of each feature, then each feature is explained in detail.

The Salesforce Blog is the official place to get information about release dates, which includes Sandbox Previews, Scratch Org/Preview Org availability, and release dates by instance. You can also see your upcoming release dates on Salesforce Status. Search for your instance, click on it, and see the Maintenance tab.

How to find the upcoming release notes & date without having to Google it & having to monitor Salesforce Blog?

You don't need to monitor the Salesforce Blog. Just sign up for the newsletter, and you'll get notifications when new updates come out. In addition, if you're a System Administrator (you have Manage All Data and Modify Users), you'll get the Admin Notification emails as well.

The Salesforce Preview Release Notes are announced in advance, also in the Salesforce Blog, with a link. In other words, there are multiple channels in which you'll be notified about the releases before they happen. I don't know the exact timing, but it seems to be six to eight weeks before releases start.

If the above is not possible, what's the best approach to keeping oriented in the release cycle?

Sign up for the newsletter. You'll be notified of new releases well in advance. You can also subscribe to Salesforce on LinkedIn, as notifications should be sent out there as well, and the main Twitter accounts also post information. There's many different ways to get notified before new releases come out. Choose as many channels as you'd like to engage in.