Magento v2.4.6 Release

And the day has come for the latest Magento 2.4.6 release for general availability! Yes, on March 14, Magento 2.4.6 will be publicly released. Though this release is a mere version change, it comes with some significant changes that you must focus on! The version features backward-incompatible modifications, including support for PHP 8.2, EOS PHP 7.4 compatibility, OpenSearch support as a default one, ElasticSearc 8.X, and more!

This latest Magento version, 2.4.6, has around 300 quality fixes and enhancements. Please find below the compiled notes on the latest Magento 2.4.6 release and what it has to share for the betterment of websites!

Extended Support and Software life cycle policies

For this year starting, Adobe extended the support period for recent Magento versions with stable updates! Yes, it made Magento ownership quite affordable for all! Security and quality patches will be managed and available for three years from the general availability date! That made the software life cycle three years.

According to this, Magento 2.4.6 version will receive the patches from the day of launching to March 14, 2026!

Magento Software Extended Support Cycle

Magento version	General Availability	End of support
Magento 2.4.4	April 12, 2022	April 24, 2025
Magento 2.4.5	August 9, 2022	August 9, 2025
Magento 2.4.6	March 14, 2023	March 14, 2026

According to Adobe, this extended support reduced the total cost of ownership as merchants probably needed to update the Magento store every two-to-three years. Even the version will be supported with core application patches (including security, performance enhancement, and quality fixes) and four security patches!

Improvements in Magento 2.4.6

• PHP Verison 8.2:

  Magento 2.4.6 introduces compatibility with the latest PHP 8.2. PHP 8.1 also remains fully compatible with the new release! If you still have PHP 7.4, you have to update to PHP 8.X as Magento 2.4.6 drops its support.

  The latest PHP version made the performance faster, with a 2.5% increase compared to PHP 8.1. Additionally, PHP 8.2 brings more security to Magento, such as, Developers can manage the class to be Read Only. This prevents the object from being changed after the first initialization.

• Limitations in the item number grid made the larger store faster

  Magento 2.4.6 enhances the performance of the more extensive product catalogs when products are in the grid view display. Merchants and store admin can limit the number of maximum product displays using the new system config setting!

  For the configuration setting, follow this path: Stores > Settings > Configuration > Advanced > Admin > Admin Grids > Limit Number of Products in Grid.

  By default, when this is enabled, the limit number is set to 20,000 products, the lower limit allowed for this option.

Magento 2.4.6 New and enhanced Functionalities

More user-friendly with enhancement to user-accessible needs

• Sign in button text label matches its accessible name.

• The Has Video checkboxes in the search filters with verbal descriptive labels.

• Previously inaccessible sub-navigation links via Keyboard can be accessed using keyboard-only mode!

• Keyboard input works as expected with Proceed to checkout, Review Order, and Place order buttons well!

• Buttons on the store front end now have descriptive accessible names.

• Focus indication on buttons works as expected when using TAB or SHIFT + TAB for page navigation.

• It works better with Screen readers, and they can successfully log in.

Other platform enhancements

This Magento version comes with lots of other performance and scalability enhancements, as narrated:

• More page loading from the cache

  In earlier versions, Magento flushes the cache when a new shipment is created, but not it will not run the full-page flush when the order is fulfilled. It will be there for orders with out-of-stock products!

  The new Magento version will validate the category page cache when stock quality changes for the products in stock. If the product quality has changed on the page, it will load fast; otherwise, it will be loaded from the cache. In the previous version, every time, pages were regenerated!

• Large customer segment stores work faster now

  With more than 100 customer segments, Magento 2.4.6 improves the stores' performance. With the new configuration setting, The Real-time Check if Customer is Matched by Segment, when disabled, it will reduce the validation of each customer segment against customers and increase the performance.

• Faster import

  New REST API endpoint, POST /rest/<store_view_code>/V1/import/csv with this new Magento version helps to increase the import performance up to 100,000 records per minute!

• Faster order processing

  Adobe Commerce and Commerce Could users will see significant and improved processing speed. It is helpful for stores with 1000 orders per minute! It can be increased and achieved with database load balancing across different nodes!

• Cart and checkout

  • Shoppers can add an extra item to the cart even when the cart contains the minimum quality of the simple product.
  • Correct calculation of the total for the refund of orders with shipping discount for Adobe Commerce users
  • Adobe Commerce displays a confirmation popup before redirecting a shopper to the next page when the shopper changes product quantity on the cart page without updating the cart and then tries to move to the other page
  • Shoppers could decrease the product quality in the cart even if it were done by the store admin.
  • Now, the mini cart shows the correct product images after running bin/magento catalog:image:resize. Previously all images were replaced by the default product placeholder image.
  • Shopping carts are no longer emptied before the order creation by Admin, and cart contents are restored if the order is canceled or abandoned. Items are removed from the cart only after order creation. The earlier version shows an empty cart when the Admin tries to create an order on the Admin manage shopping cart page.

• Catalog

  • Mobile shoppers can expand the categories with subcategories that are not possible to open or expand in the earlier version.
  • Customers can see the actual prices when logged in compared to cached prices in previous versions.
  • With website dependency, The Compare Products List feature works well in a multi-website deployment.
  • The inventory count on the storefront is accurate now when the Display Out of Stock Products configuration setting is enabled!
  • The Display Out of Stock Products configuration option now works as expected when enabled. Previously, all products were displayed as out-of-stock on the storefront when this option was enabled on the Admin.

• Other Fixes

  • Better installation, deployment & upgrade conditions
  • Magento 2.4.6 also comes with fixes for B2B features; you can refer to them on the B2B release notes
  • Fixed issue regarding reCAPTCHA validation failure at unexpected error during payment processing.
  • Invoice PDFs are fixed for bundle products.
  • Bulk images import to the gallery through the page builder work well with the drag-and-drop feature.
  • Multiple cart price rules filtration for coupon reports is available now for Magento 2.4.6.
  • The Manage coupon codes workflow with validation logic.

The points mentioned above are not completed, and you can refer to the detailed release notes on the Adobe Commerce website.

Bugs Fixes in Magento 2.4.6

As Adobe promises to fix the list of bugs with every new release of Magento, these bug fixes are also available for the previously supported versions via the Quality patches tool!

Listed are a few to take note of in the Magento 2.4.6 version:

• Allow ALL Products Per Page option to be set to yes, but no product is visible on the storefront. The patch will be available for Magento 2.4.5: ACSD-48262
• When the product is added to the cart using GraphQL, it does not display the correct cart discount. The patch is also available for Magento 2.4.4 and 2.4.5-p1: The ACSD-47955
• Set the Out-of-Stock products option to yes, but it does not return the out-of-stock for bundle products. Available for both Magento 2.4.4 - 2.4.5P1: Patch ACSD-47292
• Override of store id for quote items with default store id when GraphQL requests results. Available for Magento 2.4.3 -2.4.4: Patch MDVA-44562
• Something went wrong error while the user dismisses a notification available for Magento 2.4.0-2.4.5P1. Patch: ACSD-47336
• Search in user role does not work as expected, available for Magento 2.4.0 - 2.4.5- P1.
• If a product URL-key attribute is overridden, it will not generate an SEO-Friendly URL. Available for Magento 2.4.2- 2.4.5 P1. Patch: ACSD-45168

How to upgrade/or install Magento 2.4.6?

Magento 2.4.6 upgrade is challenging for any developer as there are backward compatibilities; replacing specific libraries with the new ones made a noticeable difference with third-party dependencies! Indeed, it shows that Merchants need professional Magento development agencies and certified resources.

Thank you for the reading, and if you want to discover more about the latest Magento release and upgrade your store to Magento 2.4.6, hit us at info@navigatecommerce.com.

---

Last update: 2023-03-15