diff --git a/.release-please-manifest.json b/.release-please-manifest.json
index ddfa3e3..8032c17 100644
--- a/.release-please-manifest.json
+++ b/.release-please-manifest.json
@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
 {
-  ".": "0.11.1"
+  ".": "0.12.0"
 }
diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 0917c70..b2f27c1 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -1,5 +1,39 @@
 # Changelog
 
+## [0.12.0](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/compare/v0.11.1...v0.12.0) (2026-10-01)
+
+
+### Features
+
+* Add detection error diagnostics and exact historical comparison ([#29](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/29)) ([19badc2](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/19badc2b753694ff97e4dc3e4dd2d50fecf1e015))
+* add explicit saved-feature staging replay ([#39](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/39)) ([aa6c368](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/aa6c3684e58f4904a6c85b85183d0cd974b337d8))
+* Add golden membership baseline and stage profiling ([#34](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/34)) ([2952aa2](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/2952aa27b1d6fc509d94b3a68d9e8dc907931586))
+* add reproducible staging training and a golden experiment ([#41](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/41)) ([c6b67ea](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/c6b67eaef591ed7032c80aa8165fe59cc3b53a0b))
+* Add train-only int8 conversion and verified release bundle ([#30](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/30)) ([43f93a3](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/43f93a3f8aafadd42cc2556c74989a32de3bc95a))
+* Prove reusable experiment blocks with a portable signal recipe ([#36](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/36)) ([f3a8637](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/f3a8637a76acba232f0aec9207b3bf1a77891a87))
+* Stage licensed releases from verified experiment bundles ([#32](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/32)) ([444fb19](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/444fb19f6a93d0ec4ff2b9ee1164303ce2e36dc2))
+* Verify scoring evidence and report first frozen detection experiment ([#28](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/28)) ([fb52ca3](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/fb52ca3bca804cbe12c28206d5ffdd3ec927c01d))
+
+
+### Bug Fixes
+
+* bind comparison checks to evaluated recipe bytes ([#38](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/38)) ([73a858e](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/73a858ea497eef7994235f5aece909fa2105830c))
+* **staging:** validate the model interface in staging evaluate ([#42](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/42)) ([e80e431](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/e80e431288d92e96b8d753666e8df6e65f51a96b)), closes [#40](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/40)
+
+
+### Performance Improvements
+
+* Vectorize detection feature preparation with exact baseline parity ([#35](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/35)) ([11584fb](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/11584fb7f80be5e2207e5a60b89d3034650f3d56))
+
+
+### Documentation
+
+* adopt shared mobile navigation and compact terminals ([#46](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/46)) ([e86a6e0](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/e86a6e018b7205217a89ae1297cba1a7654369b7))
+* Define shared KIT architecture and multibackend heliaEDGE direction ([#33](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/33)) ([6d20ef7](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/6d20ef7e5ddd9fda34b0dc3b464b2557d9d7e5e0))
+* Document BSD tooling and per-model license choices ([#31](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/31)) ([5117cc0](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/5117cc020563a84e8fda2c8baae5a07078c1b172))
+* make Astro content canonical and retire MkDocs adapter ([#49](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/49)) ([ca3db58](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/ca3db58f597215fb69e3381657a9a757cc57c671))
+* migrate sleepKIT to Astro ([#44](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/issues/44)) ([18639ad](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/commit/18639ad611491df06b554a324360c32076f1fd23))
+
 ## [0.11.1](https://github.com/AmbiqAI/sleepkit/compare/v0.11.0...v0.11.1) (2026-01-18)
 
 
diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index ccc75f2..798f551 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 [project]
 name = "sleepkit"
-version = "0.11.1"
+version = "0.12.0"
 description = "AI driven sleep monitoring kit for ultra low-power wearables."
 readme = "README.md"
 license = { text = "BSD-3-Clause" }
diff --git a/sleepkit/__init__.py b/sleepkit/__init__.py
index 4373052..e989ec3 100644
--- a/sleepkit/__init__.py
+++ b/sleepkit/__init__.py
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@
 try:
     __version__ = version("sleepkit")
 except PackageNotFoundError:
-    __version__ = "0.11.1"
+    __version__ = "0.12.0"
 
 _MODULES = {"cli", "datasets", "models", "backends", "tasks", "features"}
 _EXPORTS = {