Rust in 2026

Flagship themes are long-running efforts that span multiple goal periods. Each theme represents a vision for where Rust is headed, with concrete milestones for this year.

• Beyond the &: Smart pointers that feel as natural as & and &mut. Key 2026 milestones include:
  • experimental support for field projections,
  • progress on reborrow traits,
  • design alignment on in-place initialization.
• Unblocking dormant traits: Lending iterators, extern types, scalable vectors, and evolvable trait hierarchies. Key 2026 milestones include:
  • stabilize the next-generation trait solver,
  • stabilize the Sized hierarchy.
• Constify all the things: Structs and associated constants in generics, compile-time type introspection. Key 2026 milestones include:
  • stabilize const generics extensions,
  • prototype reflection.
• Higher-level Rust: Single-file scripts with dependencies, ergonomic ref-counting. Key 2026 milestones include:
  • stabilize cargo-script,
  • prototype the Share trait.
• Secure your supply chain: Control over public API dependencies, breaking change detection, SBOM generation. Key 2026 milestones include:
  • stabilize public/private dependencies,
  • stabilize SBOM support.
• Building blocks: Rebuild std with custom flags, integrate Cargo into larger build systems, better test tooling. Key 2026 milestones include:
  • design work on build-std,
  • prototype cargo plumbing commands.