After announcing that Magento release line 2.3 will reach End-of-Life in September this year, Adobe rolled out the pre-release of the newest version 2.4.5 on July 26. It has been in Beta testing until now, but became available to the general public on 9th of August.
The Adobe people have been working hard on this release and it contains more than 290 quality fixes and enhancements. In this post, we will cover the most important highlights from the newest Magento 2 release.
If you are still running on a Magento 2.3 version, we strongly recommend that you upgrade to Magento 2.4.5 soon. We wrote about Magento 2.3 End-of-life here.

Let’s have a look at the newest version of the Magento 2.4.x release line

The release notes for the new version are long, but we have highlighted the most notable ones here:

• 20+ security enhancements
• Google Tag module has been added to the code base for all merchants to support Google Analytics 4.
• Apple Pay is available to all merchants
• Compatibility with Page Builder v.1.7.2 and PWA Studio v.12.5.x.
• More than 290 quality fixes and enhancements
• Improved GraphQL API
  
  It is safe to say that this version is big, but it also comes with noticable better performance. For example, it can handle 3X higher order volume. We have dived a bit deeper into the release notes to highlight the most important updates

Security should be your number 1 priority when running any online Webshop. Not only can it cost you a loss of sales if you are not up to date on security, but it can also cost you loyal customers and a lot of money if your data gets stolen.
The official Adobe Commerce DevDocs states that there are more than 20 security fixes and enhancements in this update, here they are summarized:

• Google reCAPTCHA now supports Wish List sharing, Gift Card forms and Create New Account
• Security Enhancement to the Inventory template
• MaliciousCode upgraded to HTMLPurifier.
• ACL resources have now been added to Inventory.

It is still recommended to follow a few security best practices:

• Use IP allow listing
• Have a good password hygiene
• Use a unique admin location instead of /admin

The Magento platform has also received multiple enhancements in the version
Magento 2.4.5 supports

• Composer 2.2, TinyMCE  (5.10.2) and jQueryUI (1.13.1)
• DHL Integration schema has been updated from v6.0 to v6.2.
• Outdated JavaScript libraries have been updated to the latest versions
• Outdated dependencies have been removed

The new version also comes with an improved performance

• Redis cache management has been improved by the addition of TTL (expiration date) for the associated products to configurable products.
• Load time of category product list (category pages) has been improved
• Overall reduction in indexing time

There are so many other fixes, enhancements and features in this release, it is recommended you go through the entire release notes, but we have highlighted a few of the most important ones here:

• Correct logo now shows in the storefront print order/invoice/credit memo pages, instead of the Luma default logo
• Products that are set to “Not visible individually” are not correctly excluded from Advanced Search results
• The Parent Only attribute scope is now used properly in the Cart Rule condition.
• The product limit per page can now be changed within a category if “Remember Category Pagination” is enabled
• The exception that was thrown when adding a bundle product through the page builder is fixed
• Admins can set the tier-price attribute as comparable on storefront now (previously the product comparison page would crash)
• Images on product detail pages no longer shift downwards after image is loaded
• Admins can translate the “show password” checkbox on various pages

You can read all the new fixes, enhancements and features on the latest Magento version through the official release notes that can be found here:
Magento 2.4.5 Open Source
and
Magento 2.4.5 Adobe Commerce

Merchants should plan to get on this update as soon as possible, so they can be more secure and enjoy all the new bug fixes, enhancements, performance updates, and features!