diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 04be4416ac..62efd70196 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -4,6 +4,37 @@ Updates should follow the [Keep a CHANGELOG](http://keepachangelog.com/) princip
 
 ## [Unreleased][unreleased]
 
+## [0.16.0] - 2017-10-30
+
+This release contains breaking changes, several performance improvements, and two deprecations:
+
+### Added
+
+ - Added new `Xml` utility class; moved HTML/XML escaping logic into there (see deprecations below)
+
+### Changed
+
+ - `Environment::getInlineParsersForCharacter()` now returns an empty array (instead of `null`) when no matching parsers are found
+ - Three utility classes are now marked `final`:
+   - `Html5Entities`
+   - `LinkParserHelper`
+   - `UrlEncoder`
+
+### Fixed
+
+ - Improved performance of several methods (for a 10% overall performance boost - #292)
+
+### Deprecated
+
+The following methods were deprecated and are scheduled for removal in 0.17.0 or 1.0.0 (whichever comes first).  See <UPGRADE.md> for more information.
+
+ - `Cursor::advanceWhileMatches()` deprecated; use `Cursor::match()` instead.
+ - `HtmlRenderer::escape()` deprecated; use `Xml::escape()` instead.
+
+### Removed
+
+ - Removed `DelimiterStack::findFirstMatchingOpener()` which was previously deprecated in 0.15.0
+
 ## [0.15.7] - 2017-10-26
 
 ### Fixed
@@ -536,7 +567,8 @@ An unused constant and static method were deprecated and will be removed in a fu
 ### Added
  - Initial commit (compatible with jgm/stmd:spec.txt @ 0275f34)
 
-[unreleased]: https://github.com/thephpleague/commonmark/compare/0.15.7...HEAD
+[unreleased]: https://github.com/thephpleague/commonmark/compare/0.16.0...HEAD
+[0.16.0]: https://github.com/thephpleague/commonmark/compare/0.15.7...0.16.0
 [0.15.7]: https://github.com/thephpleague/commonmark/compare/0.15.6...0.15.7
 [0.15.6]: https://github.com/thephpleague/commonmark/compare/0.15.5...0.15.6
 [0.15.5]: https://github.com/thephpleague/commonmark/compare/0.15.4...0.15.5
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 4573acef44..1a7f3a0a06 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -137,7 +137,7 @@ The following table shows which versions of league/commonmark are compatible wit
     </thead>
     <tbody>
         <tr>
-            <td><strong>0.15.6</strong><br>0.15.5</td>
+            <td><strong>0.16.0</strong><br>0.15.7<br>0.15.6<br>0.15.5</td>
             <td><strong><a href="http://spec.commonmark.org/0.28/">0.28</a></strong></td>
         </tr>
         <tr>
@@ -219,11 +219,11 @@ $ ./tests/benchmark/benchmark.php
 
 ## Versioning
 
-[SemVer](http://semver.org/) will be followed closely.  0.x.0 versions will introduce breaking changes to the codebase, so be careful which version constraints you use. **It's highly recommended that you use [Composer's caret operator](https://getcomposer.org/doc/articles/versions.md#caret) to ensure compatibility**; for example: `^0.15`.  This is equivalent to `>=0.15.0 <0.16.0`.
+[SemVer](http://semver.org/) will be followed closely.  0.x.0 versions will introduce breaking changes to the codebase, so be careful which version constraints you use. **It's highly recommended that you use [Composer's caret operator](https://getcomposer.org/doc/articles/versions.md#caret) to ensure compatibility**; for example: `^0.16`.  This is equivalent to `>=0.16.0 <0.17.0`.
 
 0.x.y releases should not introduce breaking changes to the codebase; however, they might change the resulting AST or HTML output of parsed Markdown (due to bug fixes, minor spec changes, etc.)  As a result, you might get slightly different HTML, but any custom code built onto this library will still function correctly.
 
-If you're only using the `CommonMarkConverter` class to convert Markdown (no other class references, custom parsers, etc.), then it should be safe to use a broader constraint like `~0.15`, `>0.15`, etc.  I personally promise to never break this specific class in any future 0.x release.
+If you're only using the `CommonMarkConverter` class to convert Markdown (no other class references, custom parsers, etc.), then it should be safe to use a broader constraint like `~0.16`, `>0.16`, etc.  I personally promise to never break this specific class in any future 0.x release.
 
 ## Stability
 
diff --git a/UPGRADE.md b/UPGRADE.md
index ed6b3b777a..931143187d 100644
--- a/UPGRADE.md
+++ b/UPGRADE.md
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # Upgrade Instructions
 
-## 0.16.0 (unreleased)
+## 0.16.0
 
 You may continue using the deprecated items listed below in version 0.16.x.  **However, these deprecations will be removed in a future major release** (0.17.0+ or 1.0.0, whichever comes first) so consider updating your code now to prepare for that release.
 
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ More details about this change can be found here: https://github.com/thephpleagu
 
 ### `RegexHelper`
 
-`RegexHelper::REGEX_UNICODE_WHITESPACE` and `RegexHelper::getLinkDestinationRegex()` were no longer needed as of the 0.15.5 release and have therefore been deprecated.  They will be removed in 0.17.0 or 1.0.0 (whichever comes first).
+`RegexHelper::REGEX_UNICODE_WHITESPACE` and `RegexHelper::getLinkDestinationRegex()` were no longer needed as of the 0.15.5 release and have therefore been deprecated and marked for removal.
 
 ### `HtmlRenderer::escape()`
 
@@ -53,7 +53,7 @@ You should use `DelimiterStack::findMatchingOpener()` instead.
 
 The method signature is almost identical, except for the inclusion of a by-reference boolean `$oddMatch`.
 
-The deprecated `findFirstMatchingOpener()` method may be removed as early as 0.16.0 or 1.0.0.
+The deprecated `findFirstMatchingOpener()` method was removed in the 0.16.0 release.
 
 ## 0.14.0
 
diff --git a/composer.json b/composer.json
index cbaf87b1d3..3420845c98 100644
--- a/composer.json
+++ b/composer.json
@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@
     "bin": ["bin/commonmark"],
     "extra": {
         "branch-alias": {
-            "dev-master": "0.16-dev"
+            "dev-master": "0.17-dev"
         }
     }
 }