Release Channels

Gemini CLI has three release channels: stable, preview, and nightly. Stable is the default and recommended for most users. Preview gives early access to features. Nightly is for testing the latest changes. This lesson covers choosing, switching, and understanding the tradeoffs of each channel.

What you'll learn

• Stable: weekly releases, fully vetted, latest tag. Default for most users
• Preview: weekly releases, may contain regressions, preview tag
• Nightly: daily releases from main branch, least stable, nightly tag

Build it

Install the CLI from your preferred release channel using npm. You can verify the installed variant by checking the version output.

# Install stable (default)
npm install -g @google/gemini-cli

# Install preview
npm install -g @google/gemini-cli@preview

# Install nightly
npm install -g @google/gemini-cli@nightly

# Check current version
gemini --version

What goes wrong

Mistake	How you notice it	The fix
Nightly breaks existing workflows	Commands or tools behave differently after update	Switch back to stable: npm install -g @google/gemini-cli@latest
Preview features not documented	Feature works differently than expected	Preview releases may lack documentation. Check the GitHub releases page for changelogs

Next: Gemini Code Assist