diff --git a/.circleci/config.yml b/.circleci/config.yml
index 3707ed6574..0b036f3027 100644
--- a/.circleci/config.yml
+++ b/.circleci/config.yml
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ jobs:
   build-and-test:
 
     docker:
-      - image: cimg/python:3.10
+      - image: cimg/python:3.12
         environment:
           DOAJENV: test
       - image: cimg/redis:6.2.14
diff --git a/.github/workflows/dependencies-check.yml b/.github/workflows/dependencies-check.yml
index 7d56ee0a17..b522dd7b97 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/dependencies-check.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/dependencies-check.yml
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ jobs:
     - name: Set up Python
       uses: actions/setup-python@v5
       with:
-        python-version: '3.10.12'
+        python-version: '3.12'
         cache: 'pip'
 
     - name: System Information
diff --git a/.github/workflows/gen_docs.yml b/.github/workflows/gen_docs.yml
index 28d2391609..dba5987956 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/gen_docs.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/gen_docs.yml
@@ -28,10 +28,10 @@ jobs:
           token: ${{ secrets.STEVE_PAT_DOAJ_ACTIONS_DOCS }}
           fetch-depth: 0
 
-      - name: set up a python 3.10 environment
+      - name: set up a python 3.12 environment
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
-          python-version: '3.10'
+          python-version: '3.12'
         
       - name: install opensearch
         uses: esmarkowski/opensearch-github-action@v1.0.0
diff --git a/.python-version b/.python-version
index 7c7a975f4c..fdcfcfdfca 100644
--- a/.python-version
+++ b/.python-version
@@ -1 +1 @@
-3.10
\ No newline at end of file
+3.12
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/doajtest/unit/test_admin_editor_groups.py b/doajtest/unit/test_admin_editor_groups.py
index a72c5889bf..02012d35b0 100644
--- a/doajtest/unit/test_admin_editor_groups.py
+++ b/doajtest/unit/test_admin_editor_groups.py
@@ -38,5 +38,5 @@ def test_editor_group_creation_and_update(self):
             # give some time for the new record to be indexed
             time.sleep(1)
             updated_group = EditorGroup.pull(editor_group_id)
-            self.assertEquals(updated_group.name, "Test Group")
-            self.assertNotEquals(updated_group.name, "New Test Group")
+            self.assertEqual(updated_group.name, "Test Group")
+            self.assertNotEqual(updated_group.name, "New Test Group")
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index d751cff0af..45c9b4c12f 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@
 setup(
     name='doaj',
     version='8.6.0',
-    python_requires='>=3.10', # EOL October 2026
+    python_requires='>=3.12',
     packages=find_packages(),
     install_requires=[
         "awscli==1.34.25",
@@ -47,10 +47,11 @@
         #"pycountry @ git+https://github.com/DOAJ/pycountry.git@caf24adc255bccc968a16d44702e8cd6a115dd50#egg=pycountry",
         "python-dateutil",  # something else already installs this; note we need it without an explicit version freeze
         "pytz==2024.2",
-        "redis==3.3.11",
+        "redis==7.4.0",
         "requests~=2.32.3",
         "responses==0.10.6",
         "rstr~=3.2.2",
+        "setuptools<81",  # FIXME setuptools has removed pkg_resources. ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'pkg_resources'
         "tzlocal~=5.2.0",
         "Unidecode~=1.3.8",
 
@@ -60,7 +61,7 @@
         # priorities list generation
         'gspread~=5.10.0',
         'oauth2client~=4.1.3',
-        'pandas~=2.0.1',  # pandas lets us generate URLs for linkcheck
+        'pandas~=2.2.0',  # pandas lets us generate URLs for linkcheck
         'gspread-dataframe~=3.3.1',
         'gspread-formatting~=1.1.2',