* fix get azure accounts timeout issue when there is no out-bound IP ([#74191](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/74191), [@andyzhangx](https://github.com/andyzhangx))
* kubelet: resolved hang/timeout issues when running large numbers of pods with unique configmap/secret references ([#74755](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/74755), [@liggitt](https://github.com/liggitt))

### Other notable changes

* Fix aggressive VM calls for Azure VMSS ([#83102](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/83102), [@feiskyer](https://github.com/feiskyer))

* Audit logs might impact the API server performance and the latency of large request and response calls. The issue is observed under the following conditions: if `AdvancedAuditing` feature gate is enabled, which is the default case, if audit logging uses the log backend in JSON format, or if the audit policy records large API calls for requests or responses.

*   [beta] Flag `--chunk-size={SIZE}` is added to `kubectl get` to customize the number of results returned in large lists of resources. This reduces the perceived latency of managing large clusters because the server returns the first set of results to the client much more quickly. Pass 0 to disable this feature.([#53768](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/53768),[ @smarterclayton](htt...

* Fix aggressive VM calls for Azure VMSS ([#83102](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/83102), [@feiskyer](https://github.com/feiskyer))

- Kube-apiserver: gzip compression switched from level 4 to level 1 to improve large list call latencies in exchange for higher network bandwidth usage (10-50% higher). This increases the headroom before very large unpaged list calls exceed request timeout limits. ([#112398](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/112398), [@shyamjvs](https://github.com/shyamjvs)) [SIG API Machinery]

- Fix the problem where couple nodes becoming NotReady at the same time could cause master instability or even complete outage in large enough clusters. ([#88962](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/88962), [@mborsz](https://github.com/mborsz)) [SIG Apps]

- Improved how the API server responds to **list** requests where the response format negotiates to Protobuf. List responses in Protobuf are marshalled one element at the time, drastically reducing memory needed to serve large collections. Streaming list responses can be disabled via the `StreamingCollectionEncodingToProtobuf` feature gate. ([#129407](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/129407), [@serathius](https://github.com/serathius)) [SIG API Machinery, Apps,...

- Fix the problem where couple nodes becoming NotReady at the same time could cause master instability or even complete outage in large enough clusters. ([#88959](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/88959), [@mborsz](https://github.com/mborsz)) [SIG Apps]

- Kube-apiserver: `gzip` compression switched from level 4 to level 1 to improve large list call latencies in exchange for higher network bandwidth usage (10-50% higher). This increases the headroom before very large unpaged list calls exceed request timeout limits. ([#112299](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/112299), [@shyamjvs](https://github.com/shyamjvs))