Is Gitea v28.3.0 safe to update?

Yes, with care. No explicit breaking changes, but the notes mention migrations, deprecations or a new release line. Back up first.

What users are reporting

1 public report(s) mention this version, none clearly describing breakage. Most-discussed: “Org Admin-team members get 403 on the repository Actions API (runners, secrets, variables) since 28.0.0”. Sources: GitHub · checked 2026-11-02

• Org Admin-team members get 403 on the repository Actions API (runners, secrets, variables) since 28.0.0 (GitHub)

Reports are from public issue trackers and forums. Their count isn't a failure rate, and an empty list doesn't prove an update is safe.

⚠️ What breaks

Nothing explicitly breaking is flagged, but the notes mention migrations, deprecations or larger changes. Most setups upgrade fine. Back up first and update when you have time to check.

From the release notes

• New major/minor line (v28.3.0): larger changes than a patch release.
• (migrations)* Use cursor pagination for GitHub issue migration too (#39888) (#39941)
• (migrations)* Update gitea sdk to fix nil pointer panic (#39999)
• Fix OneDev migration with OneDev 16.8 and newer (#40017) (#40026)

Read the full official release notes →

✅ What to do first

1. Read the official release notes (linked in “What breaks”).
2. Back up config and data (snapshot the VM/volume if you can).
3. Note the version you are on now, so you can roll back.
4. Update, then check logs and core functions before walking away.

↩️ How to roll back to v28.2.0

Docker: snapshot/back up the data volumes first, then if needed change the tag back, e.g. image: gitea/gitea:v28.2.0, and run docker compose up -d. Tag format varies by image (some drop the “v”), so check the registry’s tag list.