Red Hat Enterprise Linux Life Cycle
Overview
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Version 8, 9, and 10
Red Hat Enterprise Linux delivers a ten-year life cycle across three production phases—Full Support, Maintenance Support, and Extended Life Phase—followed by optional extended support.
Beginning with RHEL 9, Red Hat has unified its extended support offerings under a single model: Extended Life Cycle (ELC). ELC replaces the previously separate Extended Update Support (EUS), Enhanced EUS (EEUS), and Update Services for SAP Solutions (E4S) offerings with a consistent 6-year support window for eligible minor releases. For customers who need support beyond the ELC period, Long-Life (LL) Add-on term extensions provide renewable annual increments of continued coverage.
Customers on legacy extended support offerings (EUS, Enhanced EUS, ELS) can continue using them through their committed end dates. See the Legacy Extended Support Offerings page for details on those offerings and transition guidance.
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux versions 8, 9, and 10 deliver a ten-year life cycle in Full Support and Maintenance Support Phases followed by an Extended Life Phase. With Extended Life Cycle (ELC) and Long-Life (LL) Add-On term extensions, customers can receive errata coverage for up to 14 years—and beyond—on eligible minor releases.
Life Cycle:
The Red Hat Enterprise Linux life cycle phases are designed to reduce the level of change within each major release over time and make release availability and content more predictable.
Red Hat publishes this life cycle in an effort to provide as much transparency as possible although reserves the right to make exceptions from these policies as conflicts arise. Life-cycle time spans and dates are subject to adjustment.
Errata and Support Policy
Throughout this document, references to standard errata criteria mean the following:
- Security errata (RHSA): Critical, Important, and Moderate CVEs with a CVSS score of 7 or higher (effective April 1, 2025) as defined by Red Hat
- Bug fix errata (RHBA): Urgent and Selected High Priority Bug Fixes as defined by Red Hat
All errata are provided at Red Hat's discretion. See the Issue Severity Classification page for security severity definitions.
Red Hat may choose, as a temporary measure, to address catastrophic issues with a significant customer business impact with a Hotfix while the Bug Fix Bug Advisory (RHBA) is being created.
During the life cycle for each major version, software changes to Red Hat Enterprise Linux are delivered via individual updates known as errata advisories through the Red Hat Customer Portal or other authorized Red Hat portals. Errata advisories may be released individually on an as-needed basis or aggregated as a minor release. Released errata advisories remain accessible to active subscribers for the entire Red Hat Enterprise Linux life cycle. Within each major release, any errata advisory (including one released as part of a minor release) will be applied cumulatively to the latest release, including any patch sets.
Red Hat makes commercially reasonable efforts to maintain binary compatibility for the core runtime environment across all minor releases and errata advisories. If necessary, Red Hat may make exceptions to this compatibility goal for Critical impact security or other significant issues. The binary compatibility goal is extended to Red Hat Enterprise Linux used in application containers. Additional details can be found in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 Application Compatibility Guides.
Security Maintenance
- Red Hat may provide errata per the standard errata criteria for packages within Red Hat Enterprise Linux as long as the package is not in end of life.
- Packages within RHEL 8, 9, and 10 Application Streams may have a shorter life cycle than a specific RHEL minor release. Please refer to the Application Streams life cycle for more details.
- The policy applies ONLY on current active minor releases per the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Life Cycle policy.
Bug Fix Maintenance
- The inclusions list below is a minimum set of packages that apply to Urgent bug fixes:
- bind, bash, chrony, grub2, grubby, glibc, gnutls, httpd, kernel, libgcrypt, libvirt, nss, openssh, openssl, python 3.6 (RHEL 8), python 3.9 (RHEL 9), python 3.12 (RHEL 10), qemu-kvm, rpm, sudo, systemd, wget, yum / dnf
- Urgent bugs not on the list may be addressed at Red Hat discretion.
- The policy applies ONLY on current active minor releases per the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Life Cycle Policy.
Note: Active minor releases refers to the period of time a specific minor release is maintained. For example, RHEL 10.2 with ELC is active for 6 years from general availability.
Feature Matrix
The following table details the subscription services available during the Full Support and Maintenance Support production phases. Access to previously released content and self-help through the Customer Portal are available in all phases, including the Extended Life Phase. For extended support beyond these phases, see Extended Life Cycle (ELC).
| Description | Full Support | Maintenance Support | ELC + LL |
|---|---|---|---|
| Technical Support (varies by Service Level) | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Errata Coverage (RHSA & RHBA) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Minor Releases | Yes | No | No |
| Refreshed Hardware Enablement | Native | Using Virtualization | Using Virtualization |
| Software Enhancements | Yes | No | No |
| Updated Installation Images | Yes | Yes (at first minor release GA) | No |
Production Phases
Full Support Phase
During the Full Support Phase, errata meeting the standard errata criteria will be released as they become available. Other errata advisories may be delivered as appropriate.
Software enhancements are additions of new functionality beyond correcting defects or enabling previously existing functionality on a new hardware generation. Major releases are the primary vehicle for significant software enhancements, although low-impact software enhancements may also be delivered in minor releases. If available, new or improved hardware enablement and select enhanced software functionality may be provided at the discretion of Red Hat, generally in minor releases. Hardware enablement that does not require substantial software changes may be provided independent from minor releases at Red Hat's discretion.
Minor releases will also include available and qualified errata advisories (RHSAs, RHBAs, and RHEAs). Minor releases are cumulative and include the contents of previously released updates. The focus for minor releases during this phase lies on resolving defects of medium or higher priority.
Updated installation images will be provided for minor releases during the Full Support Phase.
Maintenance Support Phase
During the Maintenance Support Phase, errata meeting the standard errata criteria will be released as they become available. Other errata advisories may be delivered as appropriate.
New functionality and new hardware enablement are not planned for availability in the Maintenance Support Phase.
Extended Life Phase
During the Extended Life Phase, a Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscription provides continued access to previously released content on the Red Hat Customer Portal, as well as other content such as documentation and the Red Hat Knowledgebase. Advice for migrating to currently supported Red Hat Enterprise Linux versions may also be provided.
For versions of products in the Extended Life Phase, Red Hat will provide limited ongoing technical support. No bug fixes, security fixes, hardware enablement or root-cause analysis will be available during this phase, and support will be provided on existing installations only.
Red Hat reserves the right to terminate the ongoing support in the Extended Life Phase for a particular version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux at any time.
Extended Life Cycle (ELC)
ELC Overview
Extended Life Cycle (ELC) is Red Hat's unified extended support model for customers who need to remain on a specific minor release beyond its standard support window. ELC provides 6 years of support from general availability for eligible even-numbered minor releases, delivering errata per the standard errata criteria as an independent stream in parallel to subsequent minor releases.
ELC replaces and over time simplifies the previously separate Extended Update Support (EUS), and Enhanced EUS, and Update Services for SAP Solutions (E4S) offerings into a single life cycle model. For details on those legacy offerings including active streams and transition guidance, see the Legacy Extended Support Offerings page.
ELC also replaces the RHEL Extended Life Cycle Support (ELS) offering beginning with RHEL 8.10 on 6/1/2029. ELC provides an additional four years of extended support for the last minor release; RHEL 8.10, 9.10, 10.10.
ELC-Eligible Releases
ELC is available for even-numbered minor releases beginning with RHEL 9.2. Each ELC stream provides 6 years of support from the minor release GA date.
| Major Version | ELC-Eligible Minor Releases | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| RHEL 8 | 8.10 (ELC Premium only) | ELC Premium extends maintenance of the final 8.10 release beyond year 10 |
| RHEL 9 | 9.2, 9.4, 9.6, 9.8, 9.10 | Even-numbered minor releases; 9.10 also eligible for ELC Premium |
| RHEL 10 | 10.2, 10.4, 10.6, 10.8, 10.10 | Even-numbered minor releases; SAP customers use ELC starting at 10.6 |
Long-Life (LL) Term Extensions
For customers who need support beyond the 6-year ELC period, Red Hat offers Long-Life (LL) term extensions. These are renewable annual increments that continue errata delivery per the standard errata criteria for a specific minor release after its ELC support ends.
| Term | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Term 1 | 1 year | First year after ELC ends |
| Term 2 | 1 year | Second year |
| Term 3 | 1 year | Third year |
| Term N | 1 year (renewable) | Fourth year and beyond; open-ended annual renewal |
If a customer does not renew at the end of any term, all previously released content is preserved in a retired archive channel. The retired channel receives no new updates, bug fixes, or CVE coverage.
ELC Planning Guides
The charts below show the full lifecycle timeline for each RHEL major version, including Base and Premium support, Premium ELC coverage for eligible minor releases, and renewable Long-Life (LL) term extensions beyond ELC. For legacy minor release planning guides showing EUS and E4S stream timelines, see the Legacy Extended Support Offerings page.
RHEL 8
RHEL 9
RHEL 10
Application Streams Life Cycle
The vast majority of packages in Red Hat Enterprise Linux versions 8, 9, and 10, including most Application Streams, will be maintained for the full 10 year Red Hat Enterprise Linux life cycle. Specified life cycle components, however, will be maintained for less than 10 years, with a specified life cycle often matching the upstream life of the component.
Application Streams will adhere to the errata criteria for the 10 year life cycle of the major release. No new Application Streams will be released during the Maintenance Support Phase and Extended Life Phase since Software Enhancements are not permitted during these phases. However, to achieve the 10 years support criteria for RHEL, one version of each Application Stream will be identified at the start of the Maintenance Support Phase and that version will receive maintenance as described by the support phases.
Please see the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Application Streams Life Cycle page for more information.
Virtualization
Virtualization provides hardware abstraction for guest operating systems, allowing a guest running an older version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux to be deployed on a virtualization host that supports newer hardware. For example, a RHEL 7 guest can be hosted by RHEL 9 on a latest-generation processor.
During the Full Support Phase, native hardware enablement is provided by backporting hardware drivers to the relevant version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. During the Maintenance Support Phase, refreshed hardware enablement is achieved by running an earlier version as a virtualized guest on a newer version as described above. Hardware certification, including the associated hardware limits, applies to the version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux being used as the host.
Red Hat intends to support those versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux that are still within the Production or Extended Life Phase when run as virtualized guests on later versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
The Red Hat Enterprise Linux virtualization support matrix provides details on the supported combinations of operating systems, versions, and hardware architectures.
Life-cycle Dates
All future dates mentioned for "End of Full Support" and "End of Maintenance Support" are close approximations, non definitive, and subject to change.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Life-cycle Dates
Retired Life Cycle Dates
To see the Life-cycle dates for older major, minor, and extended maintenance versions which are no longer receiving updates, please refer to https://access.redhat.com/articles/4038291
Other Related Products
For information on the life cycle of Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Real Time, please see https://access.redhat.com/support/policy/updates/realtime
The Resilient Storage Add-on for Red Hat Enterprise Linux is only supported on active versions of RHEL 7, 8, and 9.
