How to upgrade to Linux Mint 21.3

[clem]

https://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=4629

[Dullard du Jour]

Thank you, sir. I will do an upgrade in the next few days. Appreciate the effort from the Mint team.

[AZgl1800]

again, a Fantastic job from the Mint Team.
I appreciate all of your, and your team member's efforts.

[origin2000]

Another awesome release, easy to deal with, beautifully done. Thank you so much.

[SMG]

Moderator note: rchapanis's question can now be found here Currently running LM19.3 - what can I upgrade to?.

[Akelbee]

In the latest 31st January LM Monthly News blog it's stated:
"The latest version of the upgrade tool, which features improved detection and handling of orphan/foreign packages, was backported to Linux Mint 20.3.
This makes the upgrade path from 20.3 to 21 much easier than before."

From this I would deduce that I could initiate an upgrade of my freshly updated 20.3 version by means of the Update Manager's Edit-menu and its "Upgrade to "Linux Mint 21.3 Virginia"-option that is illustrated in the 14th January blog on "How to upgrade to Linux Mint 21.3".

However, I find no such menu item in my Update Manager's Edit menu, so I wonder what does "makes the upgrade path from 20.3 to 21 much easier" really mean?

Also, in the blog on "How to upgrade to Linux Mint 21.3" it is stated that "If the upgrade is not available to you, check that you have the latest version of mint-upgrade-info (1.2.5 or higher) and restart the Update Manager by launching it again from the applications menu."
Where can we find what version of mint-upgrade-info we have? (I've searched for a file of this name, but found none.)

(I use packages.linuxmint.com and achive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu as Main and Base repositories.)

[karlchen]

In the latest 31st January LM Monthly News blog it's stated:
"The latest version of the upgrade tool, which features improved detection and handling of orphan/foreign packages, was backported to Linux Mint 20.3.
This makes the upgrade path from 20.3 to 21 much easier than before."

The last line explicitly tells that the improved backported mintupgrade tool makes upgrading from LM 20.3 to LM 21 easier.
No word to the effect that it permitted upgrading from LM 20.3 to LM 21.3 in a single step.
The steps are still:
1. from LM 20.3 to LM 21 using mintupgrade
2. from LM 21 to LM 21.3 using mintupdate

[Akelbee]

Thanks, for the clarification, karlchen.

(Considering a fresh 21.3 install ...)

[Pjotr]

(Considering a fresh 21.3 install ...)

Wise. When upgrading from one Mint series (20.x) to another (21.x), a fresh install is technically better, cleaner and even quicker to do.