The etcd team has released v3.6.0, the first minor release since v3.5.0, which introduces new features, makes progress on long-standing efforts of downgrade support and migration to v3store, and addresses numerous critical and major issues. This release also includes major optimizations in memory usage, improving efficiency and performance. Etcd has joined Kubernetes as a SIG, enabling the project to improve sustainability. Systematic robustness testing has been introduced to ensure correctness and reliability. The etcd-operator Working Group plans to improve usability. The v2store has been deprecated and v3store has become the sole source of truth for membership data. Etcd v3.6.0 is the first version to fully support downgrade, and the process involves migrating the data schema to the target version, followed by a rolling downgrade. The release also introduces Kubernetes-style feature gates for managing new features, and supports /livez and /readyz endpoints, aligning with Kubernetes' Liveness and Readiness probes. The release has also improved memory usage by at least 50% and delivered an average performance improvement of approximately 10% in both read and write throughput.