26.3 is successor of 1.1
first here RC1 with many features, bugfix and changes in comparison to 1.1 with last 1.1.4.
Some PRs are in pipe to planned 26.3 final.
Users should test their models to find regressions.
There are some improvements in FEM workbench to all solvers and most for calculix.
Download is here:
https://github.com/FreeCAD/FreeCAD/releases/tag/26.3rc
More than 2900 changes and more than 270 in pipe in this milestone.
Yeah, there’s no official release yet, just the Release Candidates. It usually took a while before the actual release, but hopefully, this time it won’t take so long.
Yes, i think in November final is available after RC2.
Some blockers are in wip and more than 200 PRs in pipe.
Some of them will go to 27.1.
CAD and BIM are actual the main points of development.
Opencascade 8.0 with modernized 3D core is here the highlight with some important improvements at import and export of cad data.
Great improvement is in Opencascade 8.1 coming to 27.1 at fillets failure.
After this much more is possible to FEM with more possible geometry.
FEA-eng is here one of the masters of calculix at FreeCAD with much work in PRs and Issues.
Greetings and thanks to him also.
Yeah, I know the guy 
But marioalexis84 is doing a really amazing work on FEM and ickby implemented advanced meshing with Gmsh (including transfinite hex meshes) for this release.