Upgrade to the Yokohama release

Yokohama Release Notes

Release

yokohama

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en-US

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Yokohama Release Notes

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Upgrade to the Yokohama release

Release version: Yokohama

Updated January 30, 2025

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Summary of Upgrade to the Yokohama release

Upgrading your ServiceNow instance to the Yokohama release involves careful planning, testing, and validation to ensure a safe and successful transition. The process includes reading release notes, preparing non-production environments, scheduling upgrades, and validating changes before upgrading your production instance.

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Upgrade Process Steps

Phase 1 - Read the release notes and plan your upgrade: Review the release notes thoroughly to understand required upgrade and migration tasks. This helps you plan effectively.
Phase 2 - Prepare for the development instance upgrade: Request a full clone of your production instance onto a non-production environment to estimate upgrade duration and verify current and target version details.
Phase 3 - Verify upgrade configurations and schedule the development upgrade: Check the “Check distribution for possible upgrade” scheduled job to coordinate timing, then schedule the upgrade via Now Support.
Phase 4 - Upgrade and validate the development instance: Use the Upgrade Monitor to track progress, process skipped records, identify update sets, and conduct functional testing.
Phase 5 - Upgrade and validate other non-production instances: After refining your development instance, upgrade other non-production environments like test instances, applying post-upgrade changes such as activating plugins and applying update sets.
Phase 6 - Prepare to upgrade the production instance: Ensure your test environment accurately represents production to prepare for the production upgrade.
Phase 7 - Upgrade the production instance: Upgrade your production instance last, then validate completion, apply update sets and fix scripts, and perform post-upgrade user acceptance testing (UAT).

Key Outcomes

Minimized risk by validating upgrades in non-production instances first.
Clear visibility into upgrade progress through the Upgrade Monitor.
Well-planned scheduling and coordination with ServiceNow support to reduce downtime.
Validated functionality and user acceptance to ensure a smooth transition to the Yokohama release.

Upgrading and patching your instance requires planning, testing, and validation. To ensure a safe and effective upgrade, read the release notes, create upgrade plans, and test your upgrade on non-production instances before upgrading your production instance.

Important:

These topics contain in-depth explanations about upgrades. For a step-by-step reference of upgrade steps, refer to the Upgrade planning checklist.


	Phase 1 - Read the release notes and plan your upgrade Before you begin the upgrade process, it is essential to read the release notes for your target version so you understand the required upgrade and migration tasks. This information helps you plan a safe and effective upgrade.
	Phase 2 - Prepare for the development instance upgrade For a better understanding of your production upgrade duration, request a full clone of your production instance (including large tables and attachments) onto a non-production instance. Confirm your current and target release versions, because you will later use this information when scheduling your upgrade in Now Support.
	Phase 3 - Verify your upgrade configurations and schedule the development instance upgrade in Now Support Check the configuration of the Check distribution for possible upgrade scheduled job to view how often and when it runs. Review information about timing your upgrade in coordination with the Check distribution for possible upgrade scheduled job. Then, schedule your upgrade in Now Support.
	Phase 4 - Upgrade and validate the development instance Track the progress of your upgrades with the Upgrade Monitor. For your first non-production instance upgrade (your development instance), use the Upgrade Monitor to process the skipped list of records that were not addressed in the upgrade. Then identify your update sets and perform functional testing.
	Phase 5 - If applicable: Upgrade and validate your other non-production instances, such as your test instance After you've configured and refined your development instance, request to upgrade any other non-production instances you have, such as a test instance. Immediately after the upgrade is complete, apply the post-upgrade changes made to your development instance, including activating optional plugins, installing and upgrading applications, and applying update sets.
	Phase 6 - Prepare to upgrade the production instance After you have configured and refined your test environment to be a good representation of your production environment, prepare to upgrade your production instance.
	Phase 7 - Upgrade the production instance After you have upgraded your development, non-production, and test instances, upgrade your production instance last. Then validate that the upgrade was complete, apply update sets and fix scripts, and perform post-upgrade user acceptance testing (UAT).