Podman 5.2.0 released: Full libkrun support on MacOS, enhanced Quadlet features, and more

The Podman upstream team has released Podman version 5.2.0, introducing several significant updates. This version is the first to fully support libkrun as a backend for creating virtual machines (VMs) on MacOS, including the ability to mount GPUs into VMs for enhanced AI workload acceleration. Despite this new capability, applehv remains the default backend for VM creation on MacOS.

Quadlet, a key component of Podman, now supports .build files, allowing image construction directly within Quadlet for container use. New fields, LogOpt and StopSignal, have been added to Quadlet .container files for specific logging configurations and stop signals. Additionally, the NetworkAlias field is now supported in Quadlet .container and .pod files, enabling the addition of network aliases.

The update also expands Quadlet drop-in search paths to include top-level type drop-ins (container.d, pod.d) and truncated unit drop-ins (unit-.container.d). A new command, podman system check, has been introduced to identify and correct corruption within local container storage. The podman machine reset command has been enhanced to reset all providers on the current OS, ensuring the removal of both HyperV and WSL podman machine VMs on Windows. For more details, refer to the Podman v5.2.0 Release Notes on GitHub.