Published: July 15th, 2025 in Videos

Upgrade to pfSense 2.8.0 (Full Walkthrough + New Features!)

By Sam Sheridan - 15th July, 2025

We’ve just released a full step-by-step walkthrough on upgrading from pfSense Community Edition 2.7.x to the newly released pfSense 2.8.0.

In this guide, I walk through the entire upgrade process from start to finish, including:

Preparing your system (backups, config export, package review)
Running the upgrade via the pfSense web interface
Post-upgrade sanity checks
Exploring key new features in 2.8.0

What's New in pfSense 2.8.0?

Here are some of the most important features and changes I cover in the video:

FreeBSD 15 & PHP 8.3: Faster performance, improved hardware support
New PPPoE implementation (if_pppoe): Enables multi-gigabit speeds (optional)
Kea DHCP Server: Modern replacement for ISC DHCP with support for HA and Dynamic DNS
NAT64 / DNS64 support: Ideal for IPv6-only networks accessing IPv4 services
Interface-bound firewall states: Tighter security defaults, more control
Gateway failback improvements: More stable recovery after WAN drops
Dozens of UI, stability, and security updates

Upgrade Tips Covered in the Video

Make a full config backup before starting
Avoid upgrading packages manually beforehand – pfSense will handle that during the upgrade
ZFS users: snapshot your boot environment for easy rollback
Test features like PPPoE and NAT64 in non-production environments first

Whether you're managing a home lab, business firewall, or multi-site setup, this guide will help you upgrade smoothly and make the most of pfSense 2.8.0.

Tags:

pfsense firewalls freebsd open source

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