The Renku team has started this year working on new impactful features which provide more possibilities to your collaborative work and improve your user experience. Here’s the breakdown of what the team has released already this month.

📂 Google Drive, Dropbox now easily linked to your projects​

Over the past year, we’ve been steadily expanding the ecosystem of data sources you can bring into your Renku projects. In addition to various cloud storage options, we have also made it easy to pull from research archives like Zenodo and Dataverse, as well as domain-specific repositories like EnviDat and openBIS.

Now, we’re expanding this even further and making it possible to connect Google Drive and Dropbox directly to your projects!

How it works: Simply create a connector in your project settings, activate the integration, and you’re good to go. Your files will be ready for you the next time you launch a session.

Check out our documentation for the step-by-step guide.

🔍 Find What You Need, Faster​

We’ve given our search pages a makeover! We streamlined the interface and improved the underlying logic to help you find projects, datasets, and groups more intuitively. Whether you are looking for a teammate’s specific workflow or a public data connector to use, the experience is now much smoother.

🗓️ Admins: Stress-Free Event Planning​

Running a course or a hackathon? Now the platform infrastructure can be automatically scaled to accommodate all participants instantly.

No more waiting for resources to get provisioned while your students sit idle; just register the course or event and we’ll take care of the rest.

Are you an Administrator operating your own Renku instance? Make sure you consult our new docs on how to manage capacity reservations to understand all the options and implications!

Full Release Notes​

While these are the highlights, there were many other features addressing administrator requirements, smaller fixes and performance tweaks in these releases. For the curious, you can find the full technical breakdown on our GitHub Releases page.

🐸 Ready to get started? Hop into renkulab.io and get a jumpstart with our documentation.

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and suggestions with us on our forum.

🚀 Curious about what's coming next? Check out our roadmap to see what new features we're working on.

As one of the projects within the first SDSC national call, ETHZ SwissCAT+ teamed up with the SDSC to utilize their Renku platform to unite data, code and compute in their OpenCatData project. In this blog post we describe how ETHZ SwissCAT+ fully utilizes the features that Renku offers to augment how data can be effectively shared across different parties.

ETHZ SwissCAT+'s Challenge​

ETHZ SwissCAT+ is a technology platform that provides services to researchers in the field of catalysis. At ETHZ SwissCAT+, traditional catalysis research is complemented with high-throughput experimentation, automation and artificial intelligence thereby generating large amounts of data. With a diverse user base from various academic institutions and companies nationally and internationally, ETHZ SwissCAT+ faces the challenge to effectively communicate and share the obtained experimental data with their user base.

The Renku Platform as a Solution​

Renku offers an ideal platform to overcome this challenge as it allows to connect:

• Data created from the instruments at ETHZ SwissCAT+,
• Data processing tools developed at ETHZ SwissCAT+
• Compute resources to deploy the data processing tools

Data management Integration with Renku​

Data generated at ETHZ SwissCAT+ are stored in a data repository (for example on Polybox) and code is located in git repositories. A Renku project can be created that connects the data and the code and uses the cloud resources provided by the Renku platform to deploy them. With a single Renku project, multiple sessions can be created for accessing data and code resources in various combinations and with different visualization and analysis tools. Renku offers the possibility to create templates to further speed up the creation of new Renku projects.

Previously, users were responsible for setting up their own computational environment for reviewing the data and code results provided by ETHZ SwissCAT+. With Renku, they only need to create a user account and be granted the access rights to their data and the processing tools, and they can launch interactive Renku sessions directly in the browser.

Catalysis Performance & Characterization Data Visualization​

So far three primary session templates have been implemented at ETHZ SwissCAT+. Each session is used in combinations with different data sources and creates interactive visualization dashboards to visualize results from:

• Catalyst testing
• Thermogravimetric analysis
• Gas adsorption/desorption

Each session comes with its tailored data processing tools. For example, catalyst testing data can be aggregated and filtered, gas adsorption/desorption data are further fitted using various mathematical models to extract descriptors from the data, and thermogravimetric analysis data can be processed to obtain integrated areas, peak maximum etc from their sequential data.

Summary​

Renku has significantly enhanced the user experience for the groups that are requesting services provided by ETHZ SwissCAT+ which faces the challenge in sharing large amounts of diverse data to multiple users. In the wake of big data and open science, Renku offers the ideal and timely platform for this purpose. Check out some public Renku projects created by ETHZ SwissCAT+:

• Data Visualization Dashboard for Swiss Cat+ East A1 project
• Calcium Oxalate TGA Analysis
• Commercial Supports Gas Adsorption/Desorption Measurements

Want to learn more about how Renku can help democratize access to your research data? Explore RenkuLab or contact our team to discuss your use case.

Happy 2026, Renku community! 🚀

We hope you all had a refreshing break. While the year is just getting started, the Renku team was busy through the end of 2025 wrapping up some impactful features designed to make your collaborative research even smoother.

From better hardware support to more precise permission settings, here is a look at what’s new in Renku releases 2.10.0 through 2.12.1.

Expanding Data Access: New Connectors for EnviDat and OpenBIS​

We are thrilled to expand Renku’s "connecting hub" capabilities with two highly requested data integrations that make bringing your research data into your compute environment even faster.

EnviDat Integration​

Working with data from EnviDat, the environmental data portal of the Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL, is now effortless.

How it works: Simply copy a dataset’s DOI and create a Renku data connector in your project.

Renku automatically syncs the metadata, making the data searchable within Renku (just like our Zenodo and Dataverse integrations). When you launch a new session the data is automatically mounted, ready for immediate analysis without manual downloads.

Discover other datasets: We have also made it easier to discover other datasets from specific providers; for example, on the search page you can use a query like publisher_name:envidat to see all of the data connectors imported from EnviDat.

Enhanced OpenBIS Support​

For researchers using openBIS, we’ve introduced a dedicated data connector type to streamline navigation and data fetching. You can configure your connector to point to a specific dataset in the openBIS instance for easier sharing. This solution offers an alternative to directly using openBIS APIs from within code (e.g. pyBIS for Python).

Note on connectivity: Many openBIS instances are hosted behind institutional firewalls. If you encounter any issues connecting to your instance from Renku, please reach out to us! We’re eager to help you get your data flowing smoothly.

Acknowledgment: We are very grateful for the support of the ETH Domain Open Research Data program, which made the development of these integrations possible through project funding in Measure 2, and for our collaboration with the NEXUS team who implemented the OpenBIS feature.

💻 Seamless Support for ARM Architectures​

If you are working on a modern Mac (Apple Silicon) or running heavy workloads on HPC clusters like Alps (Daint) on CSCS, you know that architecture matters.

We’ve now automated the image-building process for arm64. When configuring your launcher, simply select the appropriate architecture, and Renku will automatically build the correct image for you. To save you from troubleshooting headaches, we’ve also added a warning if you attempt to launch an image on an incompatible compute resource.

Big thanks to our collaborators at Idiap for helping us build this functionality!

👥 Finer-Grained Group Permissions​

We’ve refined how Group roles work to give you more control over your collaborative spaces.

• The Change: Previously, Group Editors had full administrative reach over all projects within a group.
• The New Way: Group Editors can now add new projects to a group, but they cannot modify the settings of projects they don't personally own.

This creates a clearer boundary for large teams, ensuring that only Project Owners and Group Owners remain in control of critical project configurations.

Make sure to check the group permissions page in our documentation for further insights.

🔌 Smoother Repository Onboarding​

Many of you rely on our GitHub and GitLab integrations to keep your code in sync. We heard your feedback that it wasn't always clear if an integration was fully "active" until you were already inside a session, only to realize you couldn't push your code.

Now, Renku provides a clearer signal before you launch. If an integration is available but your credentials aren't linked, you'll see a prompt to connect them first. This ensures you enter your session ready to work, with all the permissions you need from the get-go.

🔗 Preserving Your Research: Legacy GitLab Redirects​

With the shutdown of Renku’s legacy GitLab instance (gitlab.renkulab.io) coming at the end of this month, we want to ensure your published work remains accessible.

If you have moved a repository to a new home (like GitHub or our new GitLab instance) and want to ensure old links, such as those in published papers, don't break, we have a solution. Simply fill out this form with your new repository location, and we will automatically redirect visitors from the old URL to the new one.

Full Release Notes​

While these are the highlights, there were many other smaller fixes and performance tweaks in these releases. For the curious, you can find the full technical breakdown on our GitHub Releases page.

🐸 Ready to get started? Hop into renkulab.io and get a jumpstart with our documentation.

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and suggestions with us on our forum.

🚀 Curious about what's coming next? Check out our roadmap to see what new features we're working on.

🚀 Launch Renku Interactive Sessions on CSCS​

You can now launch Renku sessions directly on the Swiss National Supercomputing Center (CSCS)! This feature was broadly requested by our community via the SDSC Call for Collaborations in 2024 to make it easier for researchers to access and benefit from Switzerland’s state-of-the-art computing infrastructure.

No SSH, no SLURM, no container headaches. Starting a Renku session on CSCS is exactly as easy as starting a regular Renku session: just click launch! Renku handles all the complexity— including managing job submissions and building CSCS-compatible containers for your project environment— so you can focus on your research.

Get Started with Renku on CSCS​

This is an MVP release with limited access. If you'd like to get started, register for access to the Renku:CSCS Integration!

First, connect your existing CSCS account to RenkuLab via the Renku Integrations page.

Create launchers that use CSCS resources by selecting a Renku CSCS resource class (access to these resource classes requires registration). Then, simply click 'launch' and jump into sessions that look and feel exactly like regular Renku sessions, but with access to your CSCS compute resources and data!

To learn more about how the Renku:CSCS integration works and what you can do with it, check out our RenkuLab:CSCS Integration info page.

What's next? We're continuing to develop this integration, with our next goal being simplified support for CSCS's ARM clusters, including Daint.

🔐 Private Docker Images in Sessions​

You can now use docker images from private code repositories in your Renku sessions! Previously, the "External Environment" launcher type only supported public images. Now you can connect private images from GitHub or GitLab container registries.

To get started, create a Session Launcher in External Environment mode and enter your image reference. Renku will let you know if you need to activate any additional integrations to connect to the image.

Access control stays where it belongs. Each person's ability to launch the session depends on their access rights to the image in the source system— connecting a private image to a Renku project doesn't grant anyone new access.

Note that configuring custom images requires some setup. Check out our detailed documentation guide for help getting your image configured correctly.

…and more!​

This blog post covers the highlights from releases 2.7.1 to 2.9.0. For detailed technical release notes and the complete feature list, check out our releases on GitHub.

Image courtesy of CSCS, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

🐸 Ready to get started? Hop into renkulab.io and get a jumpstart with our documentation.

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and suggestions with us on our forum.

🚀 Curious about what's coming next? Check out our roadmap to see what new features we're working on.

The Challenge: Valuable Data Behind Technical Barriers​

Computational science generates valuable data that can accelerate research— as long as it’s accessible to the community at large. This is where the Materials Cloud Archive (MCA) was facing a challenge: while the platform was hosting plenty of computational (materials science) research data, accessing it required a rather technical local setup, not accessible to everyone.

This is because the data consists of archives created using the AiiDA workflow manager, and, "exploring AiiDA archives historically required users to install AiiDA locally with complex dependencies like PostgreSQL and RabbitMQ," the AiiDA team explains. In addition, "users also needed prior knowledge of AiiDA's API to explore the data."

The complexity meant valuable research data was effectively locked away from researchers who weren't already familiar with AiiDA. And even experienced users had to manually download archives, configure environments, and set up profiles before beginning the meaningful work of data discovery.

The Solution: One-Click Access with Renku Launch Links​

Due to their shared commitment to research data provenance and shared Swiss origins, the AiiDA and Renku development teams have been in touch as early as 2019. The first integration was achieved by creating a template Renku project with AiiDA pre-installed. The connection between the two platforms was then achieved via parameterized launch links that pass specific MCA dataset archive IDs directly into Renku sessions.

Now, researchers simply click the Renku logo next to any AiiDA archive on MCA and are automatically launched into a fully configured environment with their selected data ready for exploration.

Evolution to Renku 2.0: The recent upgrade to Renku 2.0 brought significant improvements to the integration. The new implementation features:

• True one-click access without intermediate Renku project creation steps
• Faster startup times by deferring downloads until needed
• Intelligent customization using archive metadata
• Enhanced notebooks with AiiDA API examples

You can explore the current implementation on RenkuLab, and learn more about the technical details of the integration on the AiiDA website.

The Impact: Lowering the Barrier to Access​

What once required complex local installations, prior AiiDA knowledge, and manual configuration steps is now accessible with a single click. Researchers can discover data on MCA and immediately explore it interactively without any local setup or risk of modifying their existing installations.

"Without the infrastructure provided by Renku, the first working online deployment would likely have been achieved much later," notes the development team. While they've also been working on similar infrastructure like an AiiDAlab demo server, the Renku integration was established five years ago and continues to evolve— demonstrating the value of leveraging existing platforms rather than building from scratch.

Looking Forward: Expanding the Partnership​

The AiiDA team is exploring further expansions using Renku 2.0's new capabilities:

Expanding data access via Renku Data Connectors: The AiiDA team is exploring Renku 2.0's new data connectors to mount MCA archives directly in project filesystems, which would eliminate download times and storage limitations— crucial for large archives.

Supporting the broader AiiDA App Ecosystem: With Renku 2.0's support for arbitrary Docker images, they're exploring expanding the integration to other AiiDA applications like AiiDAlab. With this, users would be able to use the graphical user interface (GUI) provided by AiiDAlab, rather than just a single jupyter landing notebook.

The Power of Collaboration​

"Why reinvent the wheel when a fitting solution already exists? Often (but not always, of course) it can be the quicker path to a result to invest the time finding and familiarizing oneself with existing infrastructure rather than recreating it by yourself from scratch- a classical case of KISS (keep it simple, stupid)." says the AiiDA team. "Renku has been very stable throughout the various steps of the integration. Their team has always been responsive and super helpful with any concerns or technical difficulties."

The Renku-Materials Cloud Archive integration demonstrates how the seamless integration of data repositories and compute platforms enables more researchers to engage with and reuse computational datasets, promoting scientific collaboration.

Want to learn more about how Renku can help democratize access to your research data? Explore RenkuLab or contact our team to discuss your use case.

Work in Your Favorite Local VSCode Setup​

You can now connect to your Renku sessions directly from your local VSCode application! We know many of you prefer working in your customized VSCode environment on your laptop rather than in the browser. Now you can have the best of both worlds: Renku's collaborative compute power with your personalized local development setup.

Getting connected is straightforward - just run a simple start_tunnel command inside your Renku session to establish the connection to your local VSCode. You'll find step-by-step instructions in our documentation.

Renku Legacy and GitLab Shutdowns start in 2 Months​

We have two critical deadlines coming up that require your attention:

Renku Legacy Shutdown: October 28, 2025​

Time is running short! Renku Legacy will be shut down in just 2 months on October 28. If you still have projects on the old platform, you need to migrate them before this date to maintain access. The good news? Our built-in migration tool makes this process quick and easy - you'll find built in migration tools on your Renku 2.0 dashboard and on Renku Legacy project pages.

RenkuLab GitLab Shutdown: January 2026​

The second phase of our transition is also approaching. In January 2026, we'll be shutting down the RenkuLab GitLab instance. This means you need to move your code repositories to external git providers like GitHub or GitLab.com (both integrate seamlessly with Renku!). You'll find complete step-by-step migration instructions in our transition guide.

New feature alert: Want your old gitlab.renkulab.io repository links to automatically redirect to your new repository? You can now register your new repository location and we'll set up automatic redirects for you.

We've Moved! RenkuLab's New Home in Microsoft Azure​

Here's some behind-the-scenes news that might interest you: On August 21, RenkuLab successfully moved from Switch Engines to its new home in Microsoft Azure's Switzerland-North datacenter. This was a massive undertaking that our operations team executed brilliantly, resulting in only a few hours of downtime despite months of preparation. Our new home cloud affords us the resource flexibility our users require while also giving us the tools we need to optimize costs.

Curious to learn more about why we made this change or wondering if you can still run your Renku sessions on Switch infrastructure? (spoiler- yes you can!) We've got all the details in our dedicated blog post about the migration.

…and more!​

This blog post covers the highlights from releases 2.6.0 to 2.7.0. For detailed technical release notes and the complete feature list, check out our releases on GitHub.

🐸 Ready to get started? Hop into renkulab.io and get a jumpstart with our documentation.

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and suggestions with us on our forum.

🚀 Curious about what's coming next? Check out our roadmap to see what new features we're working on.

Why change cloud providers?​

Since 2018, we have operated renkulab.io (and our development infrastructure) on Switch Engines hosted here in Zürich. This suited our needs for quite some time and we very much appreciated the help and responsiveness of the Switch Engines team during the years when Renku was growing.

However, as our user-base and use-cases grew, so have the demands for rather complex compute configurations that could no longer be met flexibly in our existing configuration. Furthermore, the usage on renkulab.io was often very “peaky”, meaning that a lot of resources were needed for a few hours a day (e.g. large courses or workshops) and far fewer the rest of the time. We did the best we could to manage costs by scaling our infrastructure manually, but this meant that either sometimes users could not get access to resources quickly enough, or we had to leave things over-provisioned.

As a result, we decided to migrate our base platform to an infrastructure that affords us the flexibility our users require while also giving us the tools we need to optimize costs. At the time we needed to make a decision about where to migrate our production instance, the new Switch Cloud offering was not quite in a production stage yet, so our choices were limited to the major public cloud offerings. After testing all of them, the decision was made to choose Microsoft Azure as the new home for renkulab.io.

Can we continue using Switch (or other cloud) resources?​

Yes! Recently we completed a big feature that allows us to connect renkulab.io to external compute resources. This means that those users who already have Switch subscriptions and would like to keep using those resources with the convenience of the Renku interface can absolutely do so! We are also making a joint effort with Switch engineers to make this integration as seamless as possible. This new integration will take advantage of the new Switch Cloud infrastructure, which should make it easier to manage and scale.

Similarly, those with existing Azure or other cloud subscriptions can also take advantage of this integration possibility and integrate their own resources into renkulab.io that can then be used by group or collaboration members.

We will have more information on this shortly, but if you are interested in this feel free to reach out to us at hello@renku.io.

A huge thanks once again to the Switch Engines team who supported us over the past few years; we look forward to building up this next, cloud-agnostic iteration of the Renku platform!

🐸 Ready to get started? Hop into renkulab.io and get a jumpstart with our documentation.

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and suggestions with us on our forum.

🔍 Organize and Share your Group's Projects and Data​

Whether you're a lab manager who needs to oversee all the projects in your group, a researcher who wants to discover and reuse work from across your team, or a group leader who wants to showcase the output of your group in a FAIR manner, Renku group pages make organizing, discovering, and sharing research content simple.

Find the new group search in a tab near the top of your group pages.

Search by Everything That Matters​

The new group search goes beyond just finding projects and data by name. You can now:

• Filter by project members: Find all projects a specific lab member is working on with a single click.
• Search by keywords: Organize your projects and data connectors by topic, status, funding source, or any other categorization that makes sense for your team.

Showcase Your Research​

You can share your group page with anyone — even outside of Renku — and they'll be able to browse all your public projects and jump straight into interactive sessions. It's research sharing made simple.

Even better, you can create filtered views and share direct links that highlight specific content. Want to show a funder all projects related to a particular keyword? Or demonstrate your lab's work in a specific research area? Just create a filtered view and share the link.

🏷️ Keywords for Data Connectors​

As part of our broader effort to improve content organization, you can now add keywords to data connectors, just like you can for projects.

🌅 Renku Legacy Transition: Migrate your Projects by October for continued access​

Our transition from Renku Legacy continues on schedule, with a helpful new feature that makes the migration even smoother. As a reminder of where we are in the sunsetting process:

• ✅ July 15, 2025: We turned off the ability to create new projects and datasets in Renku Legacy.
• August 2025: We will disable sessions in Renku Legacy.
• October 2025: Renku Legacy will be fully turned off. Migrate your projects to maintain access!

Old Links, New Destination​

New: Session autostart links from Renku Legacy now automatically redirect to Renku 2.0 when the project has been migrated. To create new autostart links in Renku 2.0, use Renku Launch Links.

Links to Renku Legacy projects will also automatically redirect to Renku 2.0 when Renku Legacy is shut down in October. This means that bookmarks, published links, and embedded URLs will continue to work seamlessly. However, these redirects will only work for migrated projects, so make sure to migrate your projects to Renku 2.0 before October!

Need Help with the Transition to Renku 2.0?​

For complete information about the Renku Legacy sunset process, including migration guides and timelines, visit our dedicated transition guide.

…and more!​

This blog post covers the highlights from releases 2.1.0 to 2.5.0. For detailed technical release notes and the complete feature list, check out our releases on GitHub.

🐸 Ready to get started? Hop into renkulab.io and get a jumpstart with our documentation.

📺 Want to see these features in action? Watch these features demoed by the team who built them in the Renku Feature Preview • July 2025!

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and suggestions with us on our forum.

🚀 Curious about what's coming next? Check out our roadmap to see what new features we're working on.

What is Renku 2.0?​

Renku 2.0 represents a fundamental shift in how we think about research collaboration platforms. While our original Renku aimed to be an all-in-one solution, Renku 2.0 takes a different approach: it's designed as a connection hub that brings together your favorite tools, data sources, and computing resources in one seamless experience.

At its core, Renku 2.0 is built around the concept of external integrations and flexibility. Renku lets you connect your existing resources together —whether that's a GitHub repository, an S3 bucket, or a dataset from Zenodo— into a cohesive and shareable project.

Want to Learn More? Join Our Community Events!​

We'll be hosting a launch webinar on June 5th where our team will walk you through Renku 2.0's key features, demonstrate the platform in action, and answer your questions. Register now for this 1 hour webinar!

In addition, we're hosting the third annual Renku Users Meeting on June 23rd. It's the perfect opportunity to connect with other researchers, teachers, and data scientists passionate about collaboration. This event is hybrid: in person in Bern and on Zoom. Register here to save your spot!

How is Renku 2.0 Different from Renku Legacy?​

The transformation from Renku Legacy to Renku 2.0 is substantial. In short, we've evolved from a monolithic, all-in-one platform to a flexible, integration-focused approach that connects your existing tools while lowering technical barriers for everyone involved in a data science project.

For a comprehensive deep-dive into these differences and what they mean for your projects, check out our detailed comparison blog post.

What's Happening to Renku Legacy (”1.0”)?​

Through Autumn 2025, Legacy will continue to be available. You can access Renku Legacy via the user menu in the top right.

As we fully embrace the future with Renku 2.0, we'll be sunsetting Renku Legacy over the next six months. This includes shutting down the RenkuLab GitLab instance in early 2026. We know transitions can feel daunting, but we're committed to making this as smooth as possible.

Important note for course instructors: Please plan to use Renku 2.0 for your courses this autumn semester rather than Renku Legacy. We'll provide comprehensive support, tools, and resources throughout this transition to ensure you and your students have everything you need.

For complete details about the transition timeline and what it means for your projects, see our transition guide.

What's Next for Renku?​

We're just getting started! The second half of 2025 holds some exciting developments:

• External Compute Integrations: We're working on connecting Renku with public cloud providers and HPC systems. Soon, you'll be able to link your cloud subscriptions directly with Renku, giving you complete control over your compute resources while enjoying our user-friendly interface. For HPC users, we're developing integrations that make these powerful resources more accessible and collaborative than ever.

• Data Repository Integrations: We're building stronger connections with data repositories, particularly those within the ETH Domain, making it easier to connect data sources into your research.

Curious about specific features and timelines? This blog is where we share release highlights, and you can check out our public roadmap to see exactly what's coming in the next few months.

Ready to Get Started?​

Renku 2.0 is now the default Renku experience, and we can't wait for you to explore what's possible. Whether you're starting a new research project or thinking about transitioning existing work, our comprehensive documentation and hands-on tutorial will help you hit the ground running.

The journey to Renku 2.0 has been incredible — from our beta release after just six months, to early access for our community after a year, and now to this full launch at eighteen months. We're immensely proud of what we've built together, and we're even more excited about what comes next.

Welcome to Renku 2.0! 🎉

With the official launch of Renku 2.0, we're ready to sunset Renku Legacy (Renku “1.0”). Here's what you need to know and what you need to do.

What's Happening and Why​

We're sunsetting Renku Legacy so we can focus all our development efforts on the new Renku platform. This allows us to build new features faster and provide better support for our growing community.

The sunsetting process has two parts:

1. Sunsetting Renku Legacy (1.0) - This refers to turning off all "legacy" Renku services and hosting of Renku 1.0 projects. We'll help you migrate projects to Renku 2.0, and going forward Renku Legacy projects will redirect to their migrated 2.0 counterparts.
2. Shutting down the RenkuLab GitLab - We'll help you move your code repositories to external providers like GitHub.com or GitLab.com, where they can continue to be connected with Renku 2.0 projects.

Timeline​

We have planned a gradual process for sunsetting Renku Legacy to give you time to make the transition with ease.

July 2025: New project creation disabled in Renku Legacy

• Existing Renku Legacy projects continue to work
• New project creation only available in Renku 2.0

August 2025: Sessions disabled in Renku Legacy

• You can view Legacy projects and migrate them to Renku 2.0
• To use computing sessions, projects must be migrated to 2.0

October 2025: Renku Legacy fully turned off

• Migrated projects will automatically redirect to Renku 2.0
• Links to Renku Legacy projects, for example those published in papers, will continue to work as long as the project has been migrated to Renku 2.0

November 2025: RenkuLab GitLab brownouts begin

• We'll start performing temporary planned outages (”brownouts”) for RenkuLab GitLab to encourage repository migration to external providers.

January 2026: RenkuLab GitLab decommissioned

• Repositories remaining at gitlab.renkulab.io will no longer be accessible.
• For links to gitlab.renkulab.io that you need to continue to work (for example, links published in papers), register the new home of your code repository for automatic redirection.

What You Need to Do​

Migrate Renku Legacy projects to 2.0​

To continue using projects currently in Renku Legacy, migrate them to 2.0 by October 28, 2025. We've built tools to make this straightforward! Your data, code, and project structure transfer over easily.

Here's how to migrate your first project: from the Renku 2.0 Dashboard, look below the projects section to find the migration banner and click on Migrate from Renku Legacy. You'll have your first project migrated in 3 clicks!

Migrate code repos in the RenkuLab GitLab to external providers​

Move your repositories to external providers by January 2026. GitHub.com and GitLab.com are popular choices and integrate seamlessly with Renku 2.0 projects. This actually makes your code more resilient since it is no longer tied to our infrastructure.

Course instructors: Transition courses to 2.0 for the Fall semester​

Plan to use Renku 2.0 for fall semester courses. Compute sessions will not be available in Renku Legacy in the fall, so transition your course materials ahead of time.

Getting Help​

We're here to support you through this transition! Migration tools are designed to be user-friendly, and you can find step-by-step guides for project and code repository migration right at the bottom of this post.

If you need specific help with migration or have other questions, our team is ready to assist. You can write in our forum or send us an email at hello@renku.io.

Appendix: Migration How To Guides​

How to Migrate Projects from Renku Legacy to Renku 2.0​

You can migrate Legacy projects directly from the Renku 2.0 dashboard. Below the Projects section of the dashboard, there's a card inviting you to migrate projects.

When you select a project to migrate, you will see an overview of how exactly each element of your project will be migrated.

In addition, on Renku Legacy project pages, you'll see a banner at the top of the page inviting you to migrate to 2.0, which will guide you through the same process.

Once you've migrated your project, after Renku Legacy is shut down, links to the Renku Legacy project will automatically redirect to the migrated Renku 2.0 project.

To learn more about project migration, check out our documentation.

How to Move a Code Repository to an External Provider​

Here are the steps to migrate a code repository from the RenkuLab GitLab to a provider such as GitHub.com or GitLab.com:

1. Clone your repository from the RenkuLab GitLab to your local machine

   git clone <renku-repo>
   

2. Create a new empty repository in your chosen provider (for example GitLab.com or GitHub.com)

3. Copy the clone URL for the new repository. We'll call this URL <new-remote>.

4. Run the following commands from inside the repository to push the repository to the new git repository provider. You may want to name your new git origin (<new-origin>) to match the provider, for example github.

   cd <renku-repo>
   git remote add <new-origin> <new-remote>
   git push --all <new-origin>
   

5. Important - The next time you push: Set your git push to push to the new origin (git provider):

   git push -u <new-origin> <current-branch>
   

6. Don't forget to update your Renku 2.0 project with the new git repository URL! Copy the clone URL of your new repository. Then, on the code repository in your Renku project, click 'Edit' and replace the old URL with the new one.

Here's a full, real-ish example (with identifiers removed 😉):

# STEP 1
git clone https://gitlab.renkulab.io/my.username/example-repo.git

# STEP 2
# Create new GitHub repo at
# https://github.com/my.username/example-repo

# STEP 4
cd example-repo
git remote add github git@github.com:my.username/example-repo.git
git push --all github

# STEP 5
# make some code changes...
git push -u github master

🪄 Connect Data Repositories in Just a Few Clicks​

Working with datasets from Zenodo, Dataverse, or other data repositories? We've got you covered. You can now connect these datasets directly to your Renku project without the usual download-and-upload dance.

Here's how simple it is: create a data connector using the new 'Import data by DOI' option, paste your dataset's DOI, and you're done. The dataset automatically mounts in your Renku session, ready to use. No more wrestling with file transfers or worrying about storage space.

Check out the documentation to get started!

✨ A fresh look for Session Launchers​

The session launcher interface has been completely redesigned with clarity in mind. We discovered that users were getting confused about what aspects of their sessions were shared with collaborators versus what remained private to their individual work.

The new design addresses this by splitting the interface clearly: the top section shows your session launcher (the shared configuration that everyone on the project can see), while the bottom section displays your personal session status. No more uncertainty about what affects your teammates and what doesn't.

But the real game-changer? You can now see your code-based environment build status at a glance. Previously, you had to open a side panel to check if your environment was still building, built successfully, or failed. Now all that information—including when it was last built—is right there on the main interface. This streamlines the workflow for our new code-based environments that let you define your computational setup from a simple environment file.

🚀 Share Session Launch Links​

Ever wanted to send someone a direct link to launch a session on your project? Maybe you're running a workshop and want participants to jump straight into the analysis, or you've built a dashboard that clients should access without navigating through project pages first.

Now you can create custom launch links that do exactly that. Share them as simple URLs or embed them as colorful markdown badges—whatever fits your workflow.

You'll find the option in the launcher dropdown on your project page, or click the 🔗 icon in your session controls if you're already working inside a session.

Make Launch Links Even Smarter with Environment Variables

Here's where it gets interesting: you can pass information directly to sessions through custom launch links. Imagine you have a data catalog with dozens of datasets. Instead of creating separate Renku projects for each one, create a single project with all your analysis tools, then generate custom launch links that tell the session which dataset to load.

When someone clicks your custom link, the dataset ID gets passed as an environment variable that your session can automatically pick up and use. One project, infinite possibilities.

Set this up by first adding environment variables to your session launcher, then customizing the values when creating your launch link through the Customize Launch Link section.

Jupyter now available for Code-Based Environments​

Prefer Jupyter over VSCode? When creating code-based environments, you can now choose your preferred interface. Because the best tool is the one that fits your workflow.

…and more!​

This release also adds search functionality for data connectors and makes it possible to migrate Renku Legacy (1.0) projects right from the Renku 2.0 dashboard. For the complete feature list, check out our release notes.

📺 Want to see these features in action? Watch these features demoed by the team who built them in the Renku Feature Preview • May 2025!

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Share questions, ideas, and feedback with us on our forum.

🚀 This release marks the official launch of Renku 2.0! If you're curious about what new features are coming up next, check out our roadmap.

Don't miss this opportunity to learn more about Renku 2.0, its roadmap and the plans for Renku Legacy (Renku 1.0).

Register for attending the webinar in advance! You will receive a confirmation email containing the link and details.

When: June 5th from 15:00 CET until 16:00 CET

Where: Zoom

Register here to get your link to the event.

🧑‍💻 Create a custom Renku session environment from code​

Need a specific set of packages in your Renku session? Now you can customize exactly what's installed in your session with Renku-built environments. Simply connect a code repository containing a file with your project dependencies (e.g. an environment.yml), and let Renku build your session environment (aka docker image) for you!

We're so excited about this feature we gave it a whole blog post of its own. Read more here or jump straight to the documentation!

📄 Add documentation to your Renku project​

Make your Renku projects your own with descriptions, links, images, formulas, and more. Click the pencil icon in the new Documentation section on the Project page to get started.

⤴️ Migrate your projects to Renku 2.0 automatically​

Migrate projects to Renku 2.0 in just a few clicks! At the top of Renku 1.0 projects, you'll now see a banner at the top of the page inviting you to migrate to 2.0. Follow the guided steps to migrate your project to 2.0.

During migration, you will see an overview of how exactly each element of your project will be migrated.

Once a project is migrated, everyone who views the project page will see a banner inviting them to the 2.0 version of the project.

To learn more about project migration, check out our documentation.

🔐 Create private data connectors​

Sometimes you want to connect data to a project without anyone else seeing it. For example, you may connect a personal web drive folder for accessing reference materials, but it doesn't make sense for anyone else in the project to see this data connector (or be prompted for credentials for it!).

Now, when you create a data connector, you can set the data connector's owner to be the project (the default), a group, or yourself. Choose the last option to create a personal data connector. (Don't worry - you can change a data connector's owner after it's created if you change your mind!)

When you link a personal data connector to a project, that data connector stays private. Other project members will simply be informed that there is a data connector on the project they can't see.

For more information about data connector permissions, see our documentation.

📺 Want to see these features in action? Watch these features demoed by the team who built them in the Renku Feature Preview • February 2025!

💬 We love to hear your feedback! Let us know what you think by writing us on our forum.

🚀 This is our last release before we launch Renku 2.0! If you're curious about what new features are coming up next, check out our roadmap.

To create a session with custom packages, create a new session launcher and select 'Create from a repository'. Select the code repository that contains a environment definition file, and you're done! Renku will take care of building the underlying docker image.

When you create a session launcher this way, your environment will start building right away. You can view the status of the environment build in the session side panel.

Once the environment is ready, launch your session, and all of the packages that were listed in your environment definition file will be available in your session!

At the moment, this functionality supports creating python environments, and we will be adding more modes soon! Check out our roadmap to learn more.

We would love to hear your feedback on this new feature! Let us know by writing us on our forum.

Join the 3rd Renku Users Meeting to learn more about Renku 2.0 and how others leverage Renku for research and teaching.

We will share the features prioritised for the second half of 2025. We are also happy to host a open forum, where you can voice your opinion and challenges regarding collaborative open research and teaching.

When: June 23rd from 13:00 CET until 16:30 CET

Where: ETH Rat Bern, Room H403, 4th Floor and Zoom

Register here to get your link to the event.

Agenda​

• 13:00-13:15 Welcome and Introduction
• 13:15-14:00 Renku 2.0 Update: Milestones, Demo & Roadmap
• 14:00-14:15 Break
• 14:15-16:30 Renku Lightening Talks: Presentations with Challenges and Solutions in Teaching and Collaborative Open Research projects
• 16:30-17:00 Networking and Refreshments

Why Renku 2.0?​

Renku's mission has always been to support researchers by enabling collaboration, data accessibility, and reusability. With Renku 2.0, we're taking this mission to the next level by making it easier than ever to connect data, code, and compute resources into a seamless research workflow.

In Renku 2.0, you can:

• Connect your favorite tools and platforms. Hook up your Renku project to GitHub repositories, external data sources, and more. Flexible integrations make collaboration easy and powerful.
• Create 'Plug and Play' projects. Mix and match code, data, and compute as needed to suit your project. You can link and reuse resources across multiple projects, too! The platform adapts to you, not the other way around.

What's Coming Next?​

We're working hard to bring you even more features as we prepare for the full launch of Renku 2.0 in spring 2025.

One of the key enhancements on the horizon is the ability to customize your compute environment. In addition, we'll be making it easier to migrate projects into Renku 2.0.

Beyond that, we're planning integrations with data repositories, support for documentation and metadata, and connections to external compute systems.

Ready to Try Renku 2.0?​

Getting started is easy! Log in to Renku, and you'll see a banner announcing Renku 2.0 Early Access. Click the “Try it out” button to explore the new platform.

Not ready to commit? No problem. You can switch back to Renku 1.0 anytime by using the button in the top navigation bar. You are free to experiment at your own pace without disrupting your existing workflows.

Stay tuned for updates, and don't hesitate to share your feedback as you explore Renku 2.0. We'd love to hear from you— reach out with your feedback, questions, or ideas! Your insights are invaluable as we refine the platform. We can't wait to see what you'll build with Renku 2.0!

Connect external Code Repositories​

You can now connect one or more Git repositories (or none!) to a Renku project.

Unlike in Renku 1.0, a Renku 2.0 project is not a Git repository itself. And when you connect a repository, Renku does not modify the code repository in any way. Your code stays as it is, and Renku stays out of the way.

Data Connectors replace Datasets​

There's no need to move your data into Renku - keep it where it's stored and simply link it to your project.

Access rights remain fully controlled by the system where your data lives. Renku does not alter permissions, so private data stays private.

While data versioning isn't a feature in Renku 2.0, you can trace how a data connector is used across projects. Open a data connector's side sheet to see all linked projects.

Do more with Sessions​

Bring a wider range of images to Renku 2.0 without the requirement for Jupyter. This makes the platform more versatile and adaptable to your needs.

Enhanced Sharing​

It's much easier to share your project in Renku 2.0. Add collaborators directly to your project, and create groups to organize collections of projects and data connectors.

A new vision for Workflows​

Instead of building our own workflow tool, Renku 2.0 embraces existing workflow tools. This allows you to use the tools you're already familiar with and integrate them seamlessly into your projects.

Start Exploring Today!​

Take Renku 2.0 for a spin and discover how easy collaborative research can be. We can't wait to see what you'll build with Renku 2.0!

We’ve been busy behind the scenes, and now it’s time to share some of the exciting updates we’ve rolled out over our last few releases. These features are part of the Renku 2.0 beta, designed to to empower collaboration and make it easier to connect and share data, code, and compute resources. Here’s a quick tour of what’s new.

Reuse Data Connectors Across Projects​

Sharing is caring, and now Renku makes it easier than ever to share and reuse data connectors (formerly called data sources) across projects. Instead of re-entering connection details every time, you can now reuse existing data connectors from your group or even other shared projects!

📌 How it works: Copy the identifier of an existing data connector (1) and link it to your project with just a few clicks (2,3).

🔗 Check out the How To guide: How to link a data connector to your project

This feature saves time, reduces duplication, and encourages collaboration. We can’t wait to see how you’ll use it!

Expanded Support to “Bring Your Own Image” to RenkuLab​

Calling all power users: You now have more flexibility when running custom images in RenkuLab sessions! Previously, your image needed to include JupyterServer. That’s no longer the case! Now, you can bring almost any Docker image that fits your needs.

🔗 Check out the How To guide: How to use your own docker image for a session launcher

This change won’t affect most users right now, but it’s part of a broader vision to make customizing session environments easier for everyone. We’re working on even more exciting updates to support your workflows—stay tuned!

Bug Fix: GitHub Connection Issue​

We’ve resolved a pesky issue that was causing trouble for some users when connecting their GitHub accounts. Thanks for your patience while we tracked this one down!

💡 Want to explore all the details? Check out the full release notes.

Join the Renku 2.0 Beta!​

All these updates are part of the Renku 2.0 beta, designed to empower collaborative research and support open data sharing. We’re actively inviting new beta testers to join us. Interested? Get in touch—we’d love to hear from you!

As always, thank you for being part of the Renku community. Your feedback and input help us shape a platform that supports open, collaborative research. Don’t hesitate to reach out!

Happy Renku-ing! 🐸

The Swiss Statistics Meeting took place on Sept. 4th and 5th 2024 in Aarau (Switzerland) and brought together specialists related to the statistics domain across private and public sectors. Multiple presentations contributed to discuss developments in research and methodological questions related to data across the data lifecycle, including topics such as data sources, data collection and management, data analysis, open data, and data security among others.

Our contribution “Renku: a platform for transparent and reproducible data-centric work” focused on those Renku features in Renku 2.0 that make it a unique platform to support transparent data-centric work. Renku connects to public and private data sources, and to code repositories. These data and code come to life in Renku sessions, where data scientists, statisticians and other practitioners can work in their prefererred compute environment (Python, RStudio, Matlab, VSCode or others) with the compute infrastructure that they select. Having data, code, and compute under the same umbrella makes it easier to share data-related work within the same team and with the broader community.

Check out the conference book of abstracts.

Nexus and Swiss Data Science Center organized the workshop "Empowering FAIR data and reproducible research" within the Personalized Health Technologies 2024 event. Participants could learn about the Gatekeeper project, where Renku is leveraged for empowering researchers to build collaborative communities within the biomedical domain by bringing together data, code and compute.

Open research leads not only to better collaboration and reuse, but also better efficiency for the individual researcher. A research project represents a complex orchestration of data, code, and compute resources: Where is this data located? Which code generated it? And where can it run? Bringing together these resources not only poses an administrative burden for the researcher, but also often blocks collaboration and makes it harder to trace and reproduce the research process. There is a need for technology to help researchers work in a rigorous, transparent, and reproducible (RTR) fashion and achieve FAIR data management (ensuring that all data is Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable).

The Gatekeeper project aims to address this need within the Biomedical domain by leveraging the open-source Renku platform, which connects the ecosystem of data, code, and compute to empower researchers to build collaborative communities.

In this workshop, the participants learned about some of the tools and techniques important for FAIR data management and RTR research, and learned how to seamlessly integrate their own research data and code into the Renku platform. In addition, participants provided valuable feedback about new requirements and necessary extensions. We acknowledge the participants' proactivity and constructive discussions.