Microsoft’s planned .NET 10 software development platform has reached the release candidate (RC) stage, with highlights including post-quantum cryptography API completion and ASP.NET Core Identity metrics.

Announced September 9 and downloadable from dotnet.microsoft.com, .NET 10 Release Candidate 1 is the first of two planned release candidates. The initial RC follows seven previews, with the first one dating back to February 25. The general release is expected in November.

With post-quantum cryptography now “API complete,” the MLDsa, MLKem, SlhDsa, and CompositeMLDsa types and associated algorithm types all have been declared for the RC 1 release. The ML-DSA class for cryptography, meanwhile, now allows signatures to be created and verified from an “external” mu (μ) value.