GCP Beta Provider (provider-family-gcp-beta): FAQ and Guidance

Summary: When to use the GCP beta provider, how graduation works, and what to expect when moving from beta to GA.

Common questions

1. When is the expected graduation timeline for a resource from the beta provider to the main provider?

There is no fixed timeline. Graduation is driven by Google Cloud, not by Upbound or the Terraform providers:

• Some Google Cloud features exist only in beta APIs. Those are exposed by the Terraform beta provider (terraform-provider-google-beta).

• When Google promotes the feature to GA, it later appears in the main Terraform provider (terraform-provider-google).

Upbound’s GCP providers follow the official Terraform providers. So “when will this resource graduate?” is determined by Google’s GA promotion of the underlying API, not by a fixed Upbound schedule.

2. When do resources graduate in general?

Resources effectively “graduate” when:

1. Google promotes the underlying API from beta to GA.

2. The feature is then added to the main Terraform Google provider (terraform-provider-google).

3. Upbound can then offer the same resource from the GA provider instead of the beta provider.

There is no automatic migration (neither in Terraform nor in Upbound’s Upjet-based providers) when a resource becomes available in the GA provider. Switching a resource from beta to GA is a manual decision (e.g. when it makes sense or when customers request it).

3. What are the differences to be aware of in the beta provider? Is it safe to run in production?

• Why beta exists: The beta provider is used when a capability is only available via Google’s beta APIs. If the feature isn’t in GA yet, the main provider cannot expose it.

• Production use: If you are comfortable with the behavior and stability of the resource and understand that the underlying Google API is beta, using the beta provider in production is a supported option. The main caveats are Google’s beta API lifecycle (possible changes or deprecation) and the lack of automatic migration to the GA provider later.

• Operational difference: The main practical difference is that moving from a beta-provider resource to a GA-provider resource later is not automatic—customers need to perform migration (e.g. import, updating Managed Resources or Compositions) when and if they switch to the GA provider.

Key points for customers and CS

References

• Terraform Google Provider (main)

• Terraform Google Beta Provider