# Release Notes - SABnzbd 5.0.3

In this fifth major release of SABnzbd, we included:

- Smarter (and potentially faster) downloads with NNTP Pipelining and Direct Write.
- Reliability gains from a reworked cache and safer processing.
- A significant number of bug fixes and platform updates.

## Features and bug fixes in 5.0.1, 5.0.2 and 5.0.3

- Fetching NZB's failed on new installations.
- Queue entries from older versions now load correctly after upgrading.
- `nzo_id` now uses GUIDs to prevent duplicates.
- Updating to 5.0 now succeeds even when duplicate `nzo_id` values exist.
- URL fetching no longer crashes when duplicate jobs are present.
- Default RSS priority is now applied correctly.
- Duplicate filenames no longer cause queue stalls.
- IPv6 binding now works correctly for the Web interface.
- The `On queue finish` action now executes reliably.
- Saving the post-processing queue no longer throws errors.
- Directory creation now handles existing directories gracefully.
- Windows and macOS: Updated Unrar to 7.21 and 7zip to 26.01.

## New features in 5.0.0

- Added support for NNTP Pipelining which eliminates idle waiting between
  requests, significantly improving speeds on high-latency connections.
  Read more here: https://sabnzbd.org/wiki/advanced/nntp-pipelining
  New servers will have `Articles per request` set to `2` by default.
  Existing servers need to be manually changed to use NNTP Pipelining.
- Implemented Direct Write to optimize assembly of downloaded files.
  Read more here: https://sabnzbd.org/wiki/advanced/direct-write
- Post-processing scripts will always be executed, even for failed jobs.
  Make sure to check the status of the job in your scripts!
- Removed Special setting `empty_postproc` as it is no longer needed.
- Complete redesign of article cache.
- Improved disk speed measurement in Status window.
- Reduced delays between jobs during post-processing.
- Improved handling of disks getting full.
- Diskspace check will now include Category-specific folders.
- If a download only contains `.nzb` files, the new downloads
  will include the name of the original download.
- No longer show tracebacks in the browser, only in the logs.
- Dropped support for Python 3.8.
- Windows: Added Windows ARM (portable) release.
- Windows and macOS: Added HTML version of the Release Notes.
- Windows and macOS: Updated Python to 3.14.4, Unrar to 7.20,
  par2cmdline-turbo to 1.4 and 7zip to 26.00.

## Bug fixes in 5.0.0

- `Check before download` could get stuck or fail to reject.
- Several stability changes for the core download process.
- If only par2 files were missing, jobs could get incorrectly aborted.
- No error was shown in case NZB upload failed.
- Correct mobile layout if `Full Width` is enabled.
- Handle passwords that exceed Unrar's password limit.
- Aborted Direct Unpack could result in no files being unpacked.
- Encrypted RAR detection could sometimes fail.
- Unwanted extension check was unreliable on passworded downloads.
- No longer exclusively lock all directory operations.
- Improved handling of non-NFC unicode filenames.
- Sorting of files inside jobs was inconsistent.
- Linux: No longer break test-data in the release package.
- Windows: Tray icon disappears after Explorer restart.
- macOS: Slow to start on some network setups.

## Changes to default settings for new installations in 5.0.0

- Default `Minimum Free Space for Temporary Download Folder` set to `500M`.
- Enabled `verify_xff_header` setting by default.

## Upgrade notices

- You can directly upgrade from version 3.0.0 and newer.
- Upgrading from older versions will require performing a `Queue repair`.
- Downgrading from version 4.2.0 or newer to 3.7.2 or older will require
  performing a `Queue repair` due to changes in the internal data format.

## Known problems and solutions

- Read `ISSUES.txt` or https://sabnzbd.org/wiki/introduction/known-issues

## Code Signing Policy

Windows code signing is provided by SignPath.io using a SignPath Foundation certificate.

## About

SABnzbd is an open-source cross-platform binary newsreader.
It simplifies the process of downloading from Usenet dramatically, thanks to its web-based
user interface and advanced built-in post-processing options that automatically verify, repair,
extract and clean up posts downloaded from Usenet.

(c) Copyright 2007-2026 by The SABnzbd-Team (sabnzbd.org)