When I got the assignment to attend KubeCon 1st of April I thought it was an April prank, but as the date got closer I realized—this is for real and I’ll be on the ground in London at the tenth anniversary of cloud native computing. I’ve seen a lot of tech events during my years in the industry while trying not to get replaced by AI and I have to say this one stands out!
Image source: CNCF YouTube Channel
Here is my recap of KubeCon + CloudNativeCon Europe 2025.
CalicoCon 2025
CalicoCon is an event that happens twice every year, as a co-located event during KubeCon NA and EU. It’s a free event that allows you to learn about Tigera’s vision for the future of networking and security in the cloud. There’s also an after-party to celebrate our community and people like you who are on this journey with us!
This year our main focus was on Calico v3.30, our upcoming release that will add a lot of anticipated features to Calico, unlocking things like observability, staged network policy, and gateway api. CalicoCon brought together cloud-native enthusiasts to explore the latest advancements in Calico and Kubernetes networking.
The following is a brief summary of this year’s CalicoCon sessions.
Note: The CalicoCon playlist with session recordings is now available on YouTube.
What’s New in Calico v3.30
Peter Kelly, VP of Engineering at Tigera, highlighted the new features in Calico v3.30. A key focus was on the new observability features, including the “Whisker” dashboard, designed to provide deeper insights into network behavior.
Enhanced Observability with Whisker
Reza, our developer advocate at TIgera, led a session dedicated to the new observability features in Calico Open Source v3.30, centered around the Whisker dashboard. The session emphasized the importance of network observability in dynamic Kubernetes environments and included a hands-on demo.
Migrating to nftables and Calico eBPF
The conference also covered important migration strategies. Leon Baron, our solutions architect at Tigera, discussed migrating to nftables to prepare for future Linux updates and avoid outages.
Ivan Sharamok, our Principal Solutions Architect at Tigera, explored migrating to Calico eBPF as a way to potentially replace kube-proxy and improve performance.
Calico APIs and Integration
Attendees learned how to integrate Calico into their environments using Calico APIs such as Goldmane, which allows people to access flows and build their own solutions around it.
AMA with Calico Engineers
CalicoCon wrapped up with an Ask Me Anything (AMA) session featuring Calico engineers Shaun Crampton and Lance Robson. Attendees had the opportunity to get their specific questions answered by these experts. Questions ranged from why eBPF to how eBPF!
Party with Calico Cool Cats
And after a day of tech talks we ended things by throwing an inclusive party for all Project Calico lovers, where we were able to engage with our community and hear their stories in a relaxed setting with great food and drink.
KubeCon Impressions
During KubeCon, there were many discussions with fans of Calico, Kubernetes, and cloud native. People were excited about the new Calico features, especially observability. Here are the most notable topics that I had the opportunity to discuss with our community:
- Observability, especially in the context of LLMs and AI-enabled explainers, and how Calico Whisker can enable the cloud-native community to accomplish this.
- Calico eBPF high-performance networking for 5G and 6G technologies.
- Platform engineering principles applied to observability.
- Multicluster management was a hot topic, and my pitch was how Calico cluster mesh allows you to have seamless communication between unlimited clusters.
- Cost management and sustainability.
- The relationship between Rust and Linux (it’s complicated 😀).
There was some confusion about the use of the Calico eBPF data plane versus Cilium, and vice versa. I’ve had the chance to talk to some amazing people who were fans of Cilium, about why they chose that project, as well as a lot of Calico fans who talked about why they chose Calico eBPF. That being said, as long as you are using a free and open source eBPF solution for your daily cloud activities, I’m happy!
In Summary
What began as a seemingly unbelievable assignment turned into an insightful and energizing experience at the tenth anniversary of KubeCon + CloudNativeCon Europe in London. Beyond the broader cloud-native ecosystem, CalicoCon 2025 provided a focused and valuable deep dive into the future of networking and security with Calico.
Overall, KubeCon + CloudNativeCon Europe 2025, and especially CalicoCon, offered a fantastic opportunity to connect with the community, explore the latest advancements, and reaffirm the critical role of networking and security in the cloud-native landscape. The energy and innovation on display were truly inspiring. While this event has concluded, our journey and engagement with the cloud-native community continues! Consider joining our mailing list to receive the latest news about Project Calico and our events.
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