Red Hat OpenShift Legacy Extended Support Offerings

Overview

This page documents Red Hat OpenShift's legacy Extended Update Support (EUS) offerings for Red Hat OpenShift 4. Customers using these offerings can continue using them through their published end dates under their existing subscription terms.

For the current Extended Life Cycle (ELC) model and support phases, see the current OpenShift life cycle policy. The legacy EUS terms documented here remain available to customers using those offerings under Red Hat OpenShift 4.

Red Hat provides a published product life cycle for Red Hat OpenShift, in order for customers and partners to effectively plan, deploy, and support their infrastructure. Red Hat publishes this life cycle in an effort to provide as much transparency as possible and may make exceptions from these policies as conflicts may arise.

Red Hat OpenShift provides a time-delineated, phased life cycle, where at least four minor versions can be supported at any time. The time period of support is fixed from the point of minor version release and offers varying levels of support and maintenance. Red Hat aims to forecast releases at a four month cadence, providing customers ample opportunity to plan.

All released errata will remain accessible to active subscribers across the entire life cycle.

For other, older versions of OpenShift, see the Life Cycle page for non-current OpenShift versions.

Planning Guides

The following diagram illustrates the legacy OpenShift life cycle and EUS add-on terms. See the OpenShift life cycle table for the published support dates for each minor release.

For the current OpenShift life cycle diagram, see the current OpenShift life cycle policy.

Errata and Support Policy

Throughout this document, references to standard errata criteria mean the following:

• Security errata (RHSA): qualified Critical, Important, and Moderate CVEs with a CVSS score of 7.0 or higher, as defined by Red Hat in a Red Hat Security Advisory (RHSA). Moderate CVEs with a CVSS score of 7.0 or higher became effective on April 1, 2025.
• Bug fix errata (RHBA): Urgent and Selected High Priority Bug Fix Advisories, as defined by Red Hat. Extended support phases limit bug fixes to urgent-priority fixes as described in the applicable phase or subscription term.

The applicable life cycle phase defines when errata meeting these criteria will or may be released. See the latest security updates for available advisories.

Red Hat provides Critical impact security fixes and selected urgent-priority bug fixes, if and when available.

Red Hat can choose to address critical or important bug fixes upon request, with significant business impact for the customer through a hot fix, as a temporary measure while the bug fix patch is being created.

The latest Major and Minor releases are the primary source for software enhancements. Roll-ups, updates, and patches are specifically reserved for bug fixes.

All released errata will remain accessible to active subscribers across the entire life cycle.

Support is provided according to the published Scope of Coverage and Service Level Agreement.

Technology Preview and Third-Party Support

Technology Preview components follow the Technology Preview policy. Third-party software follows the Third-Party Support policy.

Life Cycle Phases

Full Support

This phase begins at the GA/release of the minor version and ends after a 6 month period OR 90 days after the GA of the superseding minor release, whichever is later.

Full support is provided according to the published Scope of Coverage and Service Level Agreement. Likewise, Development Support is provided according to the published Scope of Coverage and Service Level Agreement.

During the Full Support Phase, security errata meeting the standard errata criteria will be released as they become available. Urgent and Selected High Priority Bug Fix Advisories (RHBAs) will be released as they become available; all other available fixes and qualified patches may be released via periodic updates. In order to receive security and bug fixes, customers are expected to upgrade their OpenShift environment to the most current supported micro (x.y.z) release.

Maintenance Support

This phase commences after the Full Support phase for the respective minor version and ends at 18 months after GA.

During the Maintenance Support phase, security errata meeting the standard errata criteria will be released as they become available. Urgent and Selected High Priority Bug Fix Advisories (RHBAs) may be released as they become available. Other Bug Fix and Enhancement (RHEA) Advisories may be released at Red Hat's discretion, but should not be expected.

At the end of the maintenance support phase, unless an applicable EUS subscription extends support, software and documentation will continue to be available to customers; however, no technical support will be provided except assistance to upgrade to a supported version. Full functionality of an OpenShift cluster may require access to hosted services provided by Red Hat; the availability of these services cannot be guaranteed for unmaintained and unsupported versions of OpenShift.

Extended Update Support Add-Ons

Red Hat denotes even numbered minor releases (eg 4.12, 4.14, 4.16) as Extended Update Support (EUS) releases.

Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 1

Red Hat offers an optional six months of OpenShift Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 1 for all EUS denoted releases (architecture availability). The Extended Update Support Add-On - Term 1 phase will follow the maintenance phase for the given release.

OpenShift Container Platform Extended Update Support - Long Life Add-on - Additional Term 1 Subscriptions provide technical support, backports of security updates meeting the standard security errata criteria and urgent-priority bug fixes for a predefined set of minor releases of Red Hat OpenShift for an additional 6 months, allowing for stable production environments for mission-critical applications.

Extended Update Support - Long Life Add-on - Additional Term 1 is included with all Premium subscriptions and available as an optional add-on to Standard subscriptions for OpenShift Virtualization Engine, Red Hat OpenShift Kubernetes Engine, Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform, and Red Hat OpenShift Platform Plus.

Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 2

Red Hat offers an optional twelve months of Extended Update Support denoted as, Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering -Additional Term 2, which commences at the end of the Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 1 phase for EUS releases.

Support through the Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 2 is an optional Add-On subscription available to Red Hat OpenShift customers.

Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 2 Subscriptions provide technical support, backports of security updates meeting the standard security errata criteria and urgent-priority bug fixes for platform-aligned Operators included in OpenShift Virtualization Engine, OpenShift Kubernetes Engine, as well as select OpenShift Container Platform or OpenShift Platform Plus Operators denoted on the Operator Life Cycle page. Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 2 Subscriptions inherit the Support Service Level Agreement (Standard or Premium) from the base product subscription.

The combination of Extended Update Support - Long Life Add-On - Additional Term 1 and Extended Update Support Long Life Add-on - Additional Term 2 (architecture availability) enables customers to remain with the same release of Red Hat OpenShift for a total of 36 months, allowing for stable production environments for mission-critical applications.

Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 3

Red Hat offers an optional twelve months of Extended Update Support denoted as, Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering -Additional Term 3, which commences at the end of the Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 2 phase for EUS releases.

Support through the Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 3 is an optional Add-On subscription available to Red Hat OpenShift customers.

Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 3 Subscriptions provide technical support, backports of security updates meeting the standard security errata criteria and urgent-priority bug fixes for platform-aligned Operators included in OpenShift Virtualization Engine, OpenShift Kubernetes Engine, as well as select OpenShift Container Platform or OpenShift Platform Plus Operators denoted on the Operator Life Cycle page. Extended Update Support Add-On - Long-Life Offering - Additional Term 3 Subscriptions inherit the Support Service Level Agreement (Standard or Premium) from the base product subscription.

The combination of Extended Update Support - Long Life Add-On - Additional Term 1, Extended Update Support Long Life Add-on - Additional Term 2, and Extended Update Support Long Life Add-on - Additional Term 3 (architecture availability) enables customers to remain with the same release of Red Hat OpenShift for a total of 48 months.

Architecture Availability

The OCP 4.12 Extended Update Support Add-on Term 1, Term 2, and Term 3 are only available on the x86_64 architecture. Commencing with OCP 4.14 the Extended Update Support Add-on Term 1 and Term 2 includes support across all supported architectures.

Historical EUS Releases

OpenShift 4.8 and 4.10 were EUS-designated releases with tested EUS-to-EUS update paths, but did not include an additional EUS life cycle phase. OpenShift 4.6 used an earlier Premium-only EUS model. The EUS overview retains the historical policy details.

Historical EUS-to-EUS update guidance remains available for 4.8 to 4.10, 4.10 to 4.12, 4.12 to 4.14, and 4.14 to 4.16.

Life Cycle Dates

See the OpenShift life cycle table for the published dates and support phases for each legacy OpenShift minor release. The table remains on the main OpenShift page and also includes current OpenShift releases as their dates are published.

For a historical reference of life cycle dates/phases please see the Red Hat Product Life Cycles for OpenShift.

Layered Offerings and Components

RHEL CoreOS

RHEL CoreOS is a component of OpenShift and is maintained per the OpenShift life cycle. Each release of OpenShift includes a corresponding stream of RHEL CoreOS. RHEL CoreOS version information is available on the Tested Configurations Matrix.

Layered Offerings on OpenShift

Red Hat OpenShift provides a variety of runtimes and application frameworks (provided directly from Red Hat) or our partners. All of the layered content or container offerings provided by Red Hat, our partners and/or third party providers maintain an independent lifecycle from OpenShift. As a result, it is important that you check with the content providers to see how that content is tested, certified and supported on the particular version of OpenShift you are running.

For Red Hat provided products or offerings we maintain this lifecycle and testing information in the following locations:

Operator Life Cycles

As of the release of OpenShift 4.14, all Operator life cycles are now listed in the Red Hat OpenShift Operator page.

Universal Base Image

UBI content availability follows the relevant Red Hat Enterprise Linux life cycle. UBI does not have an EUS life cycle phase. An OpenShift extended support subscription does not change the UBI content availability policy.