AlmaLinux is a free, open-source, enterprise-grade Linux distribution designed as a community-driven and fully compatible alternative to Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). It emphasizes long-term stability, predictable updates, and production-ready performance, making it well suited for enterprise and mission-critical workloads.
🧩 Core Features of AlmaLinux #
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Community-Led Governance
AlmaLinux is maintained by the AlmaLinux OS Foundation, ensuring transparent development, open decision-making, and long-term sustainability. -
Full RHEL Compatibility
The distribution delivers 1:1 binary compatibility with RHEL, allowing organizations to migrate without modifying existing applications or workflows. -
Multi-Architecture Support
AlmaLinux supports major hardware platforms, including x86_64, ARM64 (AArch64), IBM PowerPC (ppc64le), and IBM Z (s390x). -
Enterprise-Grade Reliability
Users benefit from stable release cycles, extended support lifetimes, and a rich set of development and security tools. -
Flexible Use Cases
AlmaLinux is widely adopted across on-premise servers, cloud environments, virtual machines, and containerized infrastructures.
🕰️ Historical Background #
AlmaLinux emerged in response to changes in the CentOS project direction, addressing community demand for a stable, open-source, and RHEL-compatible operating system. First released in early 2021, it quickly gained traction and has since become a leading choice for organizations transitioning away from CentOS.
🐾 AlmaLinux 9.5 Overview #
AlmaLinux 9.5, code-named Teal Serval, is officially released and built on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.5. This release introduces important updates across the kernel, development toolchains, application streams, and security components, further strengthening its appeal for enterprise and developer environments.
Key Features #
Updated Kernel and Platform Support
AlmaLinux 9.5 is powered by the Linux 5.14 kernel and continues to support x86_64, ARM64, IBM PowerPC (ppc64le), and IBM Z (s390x) architectures.
Enhanced Development Toolchains
The release includes refreshed compiler and language toolsets, such as GCC Toolset 14, LLVM Toolset 18.1, Rust Toolset 1.79, and Go Toolset 1.22. Debugging and performance analysis tools are also updated, including GDB 14.2, Valgrind 3.23.0, and SystemTap 5.1.
Application Stream Updates
AlmaLinux 9.5 ships with newer application streams, including Apache HTTP Server 2.4.62 and Node.js 22. It also introduces .NET 9.0 and BIND 9.18 for DNS services.
Security Enhancements
Security components have been strengthened with OpenSSL updated to version 3.2.2, bringing support for certificate compression and modern cryptographic algorithms. SELinux policies have also been refined, improving security for components such as the QEMU guest agent.
AlmaLinux 9.5 reinforces the project’s commitment to providing a stable, secure, and enterprise-ready Linux distribution while maintaining strict 1:1 binary compatibility with RHEL.
To upgrade from an existing AlmaLinux 9.x system, users can run:
sudo dnf upgrade -y