This topic describes the release notes for Server Load Balancer (SLB) and provides links to the relevant references.
December 2022
| Feature | Type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| NLB instances can be added to security groups. | New | Network Load Balancer (NLB) instances can be added to security groups. An NLB instance can be added to a security group to allow or deny access from the NLB instance to the Internet or private networks. | Add an NLB instance to a security group |
| Mutual authentication is supported by NLB listeners that use TCP over SSL. | Update | Mutual authentication is supported by Network Load Balancer (NLB) listeners that use TCP over SSL. | Create a listener that uses SSL over TCP |
| ALB is integrated with Quota Center. | New | Application Load Balancer (ALB) is integrated with Quota Center. You can apply for and view general quotas and privileges of ALB in the Quota Center console. |
November 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| NLB is available for commercial use. | New | The public preview and time-limited free trial of Network Load Balancer (NLB) have ended. NLB is available for commercial use. | [November 8, 2022] Announcement on the commercialization of NLB |
| Listening by port range is supported by NLB. | Update | Listening by port range is supported by Network Load Balancer (NLB). After you enable this feature, NLB can listen on all the ports in a specified port range. | |
| Terraform is supported by NLB. | Update | Terraform can be used to create and manage NLB instances. | Deploy and manage NLB instances |
| Anycast EIPs can be associated with NLB instances. | New | Anycast EIPs can be associated with Network Load Balancer (NLB) instances to enable the NLB instances to provide services over the Internet. To associate an Anycast EIP with an NLB instance, you can change the network type of the ALB instance. | Change the network type of an NLB instance |
| The source code of ALB Ingresses is available on GitHub. | Update | ALB Ingresses are compatible with NGINX Ingresses, and provide improved traffic routing capabilities based on ALB. ALB Ingresses support complex routing, automatic certificate discovery, and the HTTP, HTTPS, and QUIC protocols. In scenarios where you deploy cloud-native applications in self-managed Kubernetes clusters, ALB Ingresses meet the requirements for ultra-high elasticity and balancing of heavy traffic loads at Layer 7. |
October 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| Anycast EIPs can be associated with ALB instances. | New feature | You can associate Anycast EIPs with Application Load Balancer (ALB) instances to enable the NLB instances to provide services over the Internet. To associate an Anycast EIP with an ALB instance, you can change the network type of the ALB instance. | |
| The information about the regions that support WAF-enabled ALB instances is updated. | Update | A description of and region information about WAF-enabled ALB instances are provided. A user guide is provided to help you create and manage WAF-enabled ALB instances. | Activate and manage WAF-enabled ALB instances |
| Traffic can be mirrored to a server group of the IP type by using ALB. | Update | You can add a forwarding rule to a listener of Application Load Balancer (ALB) to mirror traffic to a server group of the IP type. | Create a forwarding rule |
| Proxy Protocol can be used by NLB to preserve client IP addresses. | New | Proxy Protocol is supported by Network Load Balancer (NLB) to pass client IP addresses to backend servers. | Obtain client IP addresses |
| On-premises servers can be added to NLB. | New | Backend servers can be specified by IP address for a server group of Network Load Balancer (NLB). You can use NLB and Cloud Enterprise Network (CEN) transit routers to enable NLB to forward requests to servers in a data center. | Add servers in data centers to an NLB instance |
September 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| IPv6 is supported by ALB. | New feature | IPv6 is supported by Application Load Balancer (ALB). You can purchase a dual-stack ALB instance and configure server groups and listeners to forward traffic from IPv6 clients to IPv4 and IPv6 backend services. |
August 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| The advanced features of ALB Ingresses are updated. | Update | Alibaba Cloud ALB Ingresses support cross-origin resource sharing (CORS), persistent TCP connections, and QPS throttling. | Advanced features |
July 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| NLB is released for public preview. | New feature | Network Load Balancer (NLB) is released for public preview. NLB instances are next-generation Layer 4 load balancers developed by Alibaba Cloud for the Internet of Everything (IoE). You can use NLB free of charge during the public preview. | |
| Consistent hashing based on URL parameters is supported by ALB. | Update | Consistent hashing based on URL parameters is supported by Application Load Balancer (ALB). Requests for the same URL parameter are forwarded to the same backend server. | Create and manage a server group |
| CORS is supported by forwarding rules of ALB. | Update | CORS is supported by forwarding rules of Application Load Balancer (ALB). If the response is returned from a URL different from the one requested by the client, it indicates that CORS is enabled. The URL includes a protocol, a domain name, and a port. | Manage forwarding rules for a listener |
| Regular expressions can be specified as the conditions of domain name-based and URL-based forwarding rules of ALB. | New feature | Domain name-based and URL-based forwarding rules are supported by Application Load Balancer (ALB) listeners. You can specify a regular expression as the condition of a domain name-based or URL-based forwarding rule for rewrites or redirects. | Create a domain name-based or URL-based forwarding rule |
June 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| Google Remote Procedure Call (gRPC) is supported by ALB. | New feature | The gRPC protocol can be used by Application Load Balancer (ALB) to provide load balancing services. If gRPC is used, only frontend data transmission is encrypted and backend data is transmitted in plaintext. After you create a gRPC server group for an ALB instance, associate the server group with an HTTPS listener, and enable HTTP/2 and health checks, the ALB instance can forward gRPC requests to the gRPC server group. | |
| WAF-enabled ALB instances are available. | Update | WAF-enabled Application Load Balancer (ALB) instances are available. As an upgrade from standard ALB instances, WAF-enabled ALB instances are integrated with Web Application Firewall (WAF) 3.0 to protect your web applications. Network traffic is filtered by WAF before it is routed to ALB listeners. | |
| WAF is supported by ALB Ingresses. | New feature | WAF is an all-in-one service that protects your websites and applications. You can use WAF to prevent data breaches, HTTP flood attacks, webshells, and web page tampering. WAF also provides virtual patches. After you enable WAF for an ALB Ingress, network traffic is filtered by WAF before it is routed to ALB listeners. | N/A |
March 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| Functions of Function Compute can be specified as backend servers of ALB. | New feature | Functions of Function Compute can be specified as backend servers of ALB. ALB can be configured to forward requests from ALB to Function Compute. | Specify a function from Function Compute as a backend server of ALB |
February 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| The gRPC protocol is supported by ALB Ingresses. | New feature | The gRPC protocol is supported by ALB Ingresses. To use gRPC, add the annotation alb.ingress.kubernetes.io/backend-protocol: "grpc". |
Configure the HTTPS or gRPC protocol |
| ALB Ingresses can be deployed based on serverless Kubernetes (ASK) Knative. | New feature | Knative is an open source and serverless application framework. Knative can help you deploy serverless workloads to Kubernetes and manage the workloads. ALB is a load balancing service intended for applications that use the HTTP, HTTPS, or Quick UDP Internet Connection (QUIC) protocol. ALB is highly scalable and can distribute large amounts of network traffic at Layer 7. ASK allows you to deploy ALB Ingresses based on Knative. | Use ALB Ingresses in Knative |
January 2022
| Feature | Change type | Description | References |
|---|---|---|---|
| Servers across virtual private clouds (VPCs) in different regions can be added to Application Load Balancer (ALB). | New feature | Backend servers can be specified for the server groups of Application Load Balancer (ALB) by IP address. Requests received by ALB can be routed to servers in other regions by using Cloud Enterprise Network (CEN) transit routers. | Add ECS instances in a VPC to an ALB instance in a different region |
| On-premises servers can be specified as the backend servers of Application Load Balancer (ALB). | New feature | Backend servers can be specified in the server groups of Application Load Balancer (ALB) by IP address. Requests received by ALB can be routed to on-premises servers by using CEN transit routers and other services. | Specify an on-premises server as a backend server of ALB |
November 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| ALB Ingresses can be created in the ACK console. | ALB Ingresses can be created in the ACK console. You can create Ingress rules in ALB Ingresses and customize Ingress configurations. ALB Ingresses use ALB instances to balance the traffic loads at Layer 7. | Access Services by using an ALB Ingress |
| A higher level of service uptime is guaranteed by Application Load Balancer (ALB) instances that support multi-zone deployment. | The service uptime guaranteed by Application Load Balancer (ALB) instances that support multi-zone deployment is improved from 99.95% to 99.995%. | SLB Service Level Agreement |
October 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| ALB Ingresses are available. | ALB Ingresses are compatible with NGINX Ingresses, and provide improved traffic routing capabilities based on ALB instances. ALB Ingresses support complex routing, automatic certificate discovery, and the HTTP, HTTPS, and QUIC protocols. In scenarios where you deploy cloud-native applications in Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) or serverless Kubernetes (ASK) clusters, ALB Ingresses meet the requirements for ultra-high elasticity and balancing of heavy traffic loads at Layer 7. | ALB Ingress overview |
September 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| ALB resource plans (subscription) are available. | Subscription resource plans are provided by ALB. After an ALB resource plan takes effect, it automatically offsets the Load Balancer Capacity Unit (LCU) fees and instance fees for ALB. Compared with the pay-as-you-go billing method, ALB resource plans can be more cost-effective. You can specify the time when you want a resource plan to take effect as needed. ALB resource plans are suitable for enterprises on a fixed budget. |
August 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| EIP bandwidth plans can be associated with ALB. | An existing EIP and an EIP bandwidth plan can be associated with an ALB instance when you create the ALB instance. After the ALB instance is associated with an EIP bandwidth plan, the ALB instance shares the bandwidth of the EIP bandwidth plan. This reduces bandwidth costs. | Use an ALB instance to provide IPv4 services |
July 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| Proxy Protocol can be used by CLB to preserve client IP addresses. | Proxy Protocol can be used by Layer 4 listeners of CLB to pass client IP addresses to backend servers. After Proxy Protocol is enabled, CLB adds a TCP header to the request without modifying the existing headers. The TCP header carries information such as the source IP address, destination IP address, source port, and destination port. | Enable Proxy Protocol for a Layer 4 listener to retrieve client IP addresses |
March 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| Mutual authentication is supported by ALB. | Mutual authentication is supported by HTTPS listeners of ALB. | |
| Outbound forwarding rules are supported by ALB. | Inbound and outbound forwarding rules are supported by ALB. | Manage forwarding rules for a listener |
January 2021
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| The monitoring feature of CLB is optimized. | The monitoring feature of CLB is optimized. By default, the health check data of forwarding rules is no longer displayed. | Set alert rules |
October 2020
| Feature | Description | References |
|---|---|---|
| ALB is released for public preview. | A free trial for ALB, a load balancing service intended for Layer 7, is available. | What is ALB? |
July 2019
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Health checks are supported. | TCP UDP HTTP HTTPS |
Execute a health check script |
| The Overview page of SLB is available. | TCP UDP HTTP HTTPS |
- |
June 2019
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| UDP and TCP listeners that belong to the same SLB instance and listen on the same port are supported in more regions. | TCP UDP |
|
| Backend servers can be added by specifying secondary IP addresses of elastic network interfaces (ENIs) that are attached to ECS instances. | UDP TCP HTTP HTTPS |
Add backend servers by specifying ENIs |
May 2019
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| A port can be listened by both a UDP and a TCP listener within the same SLB instance. | UDP TCP |
|
| Elliptic curve keys are supported. | HTTPS | Certificate requirements |
| TLS 1.3 is supported. | HTTPS | Manage TLS security policies |
| The GET method for health checks is supported by Layer 7 listeners. | HTTPS HTTP |
April 2019
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Available resources in zones can be queried by calling the API. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
DescribeAvailableResource |
| IPv6 is supported. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Overview of IPv6 CLB instances |
January 2019
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Idle instance management is supported. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Manage idle CLB instances |
November 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| HTTP requests can be redirected to HTTPS. | HTTP |
Redirect HTTP requests to HTTPS |
October 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Backend servers can be added by specifying ENIs that are attached to ECS instances in the console. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Add backend servers by specifying ENIs |
September 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Certificates provided by Alibaba Cloud Certificate Management Service can be used. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Overview |
| IPv6 is supported. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Overview of IPv6 CLB instances |
| Advanced configurations, such as custom scheduling algorithms, session persistence, and health checks, are supported in forwarding rules. | HTTP HTTPS |
Forward requests based on domain names or URLs |
August 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| The ports and weights of multiple backend servers can be modified at a time. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
July 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Resource quotas can be queried by calling the API. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
- |
| The console on the Alibaba Cloud China site is updated. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Create and manage a CLB instance |
| Consistent hash algorithms are supported. The QUIC protocol and UDP session persistence are supported by Layer 4 listeners. | UDP TCP |
June 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Custom TLS versions are supported. | HTTPS | |
| IPv6 is supported. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Overview of IPv6 CLB instances |
May 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| HTTP/2 is supported. | HTTPS | Add an HTTPS listener |
| Server Name Indication (SNI) is supported to allow multiple certificates to be associated with SLB. | HTTPS | Configure a CLB instance to serve multiple domain names over HTTPS |
| Blacklists and whitelists can be configured to enforce access control. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
|
| Access logs are supported. | HTTP HTTPS |
Configure access logs |
| Backend servers can be added by specifying ENIs that are attached to ECS instances in OpenAPI Explorer. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
AddBackendServers |
April 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Custom timeout periods can be specified for Layer 7 listeners. | HTTP HTTPS |
February 2018
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| The WebSocket and WebSocket Secure protocols are supported. | HTTP HTTPS |
WebSocket and WebSocket Secure support FAQ |
| HTTP/2 is supported. | HTTPS |
Add an HTTP listener |
November 2017
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Alibaba Cloud Security thresholds of SLB instances can be viewed. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Anti-DDoS Origin Basic |
| High-performance SLB instances are available. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
FAQ about high-performance CLB instances |
August 2017
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Layer 7 monitoring metrics such as queries per second (QPS) are supported. | HTTP HTTPS |
View monitoring information about CLB |
| Custom timeout periods can be specified for Layer 4 listeners. | TCP |
Add a TCP listener |
| The bandwidth of an SLB instance can be shared by its listeners. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
February 2017
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Primary/secondary server groups are supported. | UDP TCP |
Create and manage a primary/secondary server group |
November 2016
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| HTTP headers can be added. | HTTP HTTPS |
March 2016
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Domain name-based and URL-based forwarding rules are supported. | HTTP HTTPS |
Forward requests based on domain names or URLs |
December 2015
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| Cross-zone deployment is supported. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Regions that support CLB |
July 2015
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| HTTP health checks are supported by TCP listeners. | TCP |
Add a TCP listener |
April 2015
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| VPCs are supported. | HTTPS HTTP UDP TCP |
Create and manage a CLB instance |
January 2015
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| HTTPS is supported. | HTTPS | Add an HTTPS listener |
February 2014
| Feature | Listener | References |
|---|---|---|
| SLB is released. | HTTP TCP |
CLB overview |