CentOS® 6
Endless Lifecycle Support

Servers that run CentOS 6 versions are still working, but Red Hat is no longer providing updates covering CentOS release 6 for security vulnerabilities, as CentOS 6 reached end of life. When you see a new CVE that affects CentOS 6 you can assume that your system is now vulnerable and that there’s no fix on the horizon.

There is a way forward to safely run CentOS 6 beyond its EOL date. Just sign up for TuxCare’s ELS service for CentOS 6. We’ll cover you for critical security updates for as long as you need.

Yes, but you need to find a way to ensure that you apply critical security patches if you run CentOS 6. You can develop these patches in-house if your organization has the required Linux server kernel development expertise.

Your alternative is to partner with a vendor that can provide these patches for you. Thanks to TuxCare’s Endless Lifecycle Support, which includes full technical account management, you can now continue to use CentOS 6 for as long as you need.

CentOS as most users knew it and used it has been discontinued. Yes, CentOS Stream is a viable replacement for some workloads, but for most others, there is no alternative to CentOS, other than either a paid RHEL subscription or switching to another Linux distribution.

CentOS 6 was replaced by CentOS 7, and later by CentOS 8. One problem with both replacements is the end-of-life dates – with CentOS 8 already end of life. The bigger problem is that there won’t be a CentOS 9, which means there’s no upgrade path: CentOS 8 is end of life, and there’s nothing to follow.

Red Hat says that CentOS Stream is the next logical step, but the reality is that CentOS Stream breaks 1:1 binary compatibility with RHEL. There just isn’t a matching CentOS Stream release for the fixed-release RHEL, and there won’t be a CentOS 9 to match RHEL 9. So, there’s no CentOS 6 replacement – but you could consider an alternative such as AlmaLinux or Oracle Linux.