Migrate from CentOS Linux to a cloud-ready operating system

Across industries, organizations are moving to the cloud to streamline costs, gain efficiency, and innovate faster. In fact, enterprises run 50% of their workloads and host 48% of their data in the cloud, and migrating more workloads to the cloud is a top initiative for 44% of organizations.¹ 

Moving to a cloud environment can create additional IT complexity. Cloud strategies require careful planning to get the most from cloud investments while avoiding potential security risks, operational inefficiencies, and budget overruns. 

Standardizing on a consistent operating system (OS) across your datacenter and cloud environments can help you overcome this complexity and simplify your cloud journey. With an open source development model that delivers flexibility and innovation, Linux® is an ideal choice for cloud environments. However, not all Linux distributions are the same, and your choice of distribution can have a significant effect on the efficiency, performance, security, and cost of your cloud and datacenter environments. 

The CentOS Project stopped providing CentOS Linux releases and updates in June 2024. As a result, CentOS Linux users must migrate to a new OS to continue receiving updates, patches, and new features, and to avoid exposing their organizations to unpatched vulnerabilities and potential security breaches. While implementing a new OS may seem tedious, it also presents an opportunity to reassess your organization’s needs and choose a platform that will better support your cloud strategy now and in the future. 

A consistent, intelligent operating foundation for modern IT and enterprise hybrid cloud deployments, Red Hat® Enterprise Linux delivers substantial benefits for organizations that are migrating off of CentOS Linux. Because CentOS Linux is derived from sources published by Red Hat, you can continue to use many of the same skills, techniques, and elements while gaining the features, tools, support, and value you need to be successful in the cloud. 

Consistency is a key factor in successful cloud journeys, and a standardized, single operating foundation across your datacenter and cloud environments can greatly simplify your path. Rather than splitting operations and management into multiple domains, your teams can use a single set of tools and platforms to deploy, run, and move applications and workloads across multiple footprints.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux brings together your datacenter and cloud infrastructure to streamline operations, increase flexibility, and help you make the most of your cloud investments. This cloud-ready OS provides a consistent, tailored experience across footprints, including physical, virtualized, hybrid cloud, multicloud, and even edge infrastructure. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is certified for use with all major cloud providers, including Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud, IBM Cloud. 

Red Hat Enterprise Linux worked closely with AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud, the largest cloud computing providers, to create Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) offerings optimized for cloud. These offerings bring together a leading Linux OS with built-in, cloud provider-specific configurations that ensure performance, integration, and observability for your cloud workloads so you can focus on initiatives that move your business forward, rather than spending time on operational tasks.

Benefits of cloud-optimized Red Hat Enterprise Linux

• Save time with a pretuned image that is ready to run. Red Hat Enterprise Linux images are well integrated and preconfigured for performance with cloud provider-specific profiles.
• Simplify monitoring with enhanced observability and reporting. View Red Hat Enterprise Linux assets in the same manner as you view the rest of your assets in the cloud.
• Speed operations with built-in management tools. Preconfigured with each cloud provider's specific tools, enabling “ready to run” management on your cloud of choice.
• Increased security from boot to runtime. Secure boot and image attestation ensure customer workloads run on the latest top-down security technologies from image boot through runtime.
• Minimize infrastructure deviation. Image mode simplifies building, deploying, and managing Red Hat Enterprise Linux with container tools and technologies, and it allows for automated updates and rollbacks—just like your smartphone.

While CentOS Linux is derived from public sources published by Red Hat, it is not the same OS, and it does not offer the enterprise features, tools, or support that come with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Moving to Red Hat Enterprise Linux gives you direct access to the latest enterprise-ready Linux innovations, certified for use with Red Hat’s portfolio of software, automation, and management technologies. Cross-product integration, certification with a large ecosystem of partner products, and a choice of architectures and versions improve interoperability across hybrid and multicloud environments. Intense testing and hardening and a controlled, trusted software supply chain allow you to foster innovation without compromising reliability. Red Hat also partners with leading hardware, software, and cloud vendors to give you more choice, innovation, and stability. In fact, you can likely continue to use the third-party products and tools you already have with Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Developing and testing applications in a different environment than you use for production deployment can lead to issues in production, and developers may not receive the tools, resources, and support they need to be most productive. Adopting a common platform like Red Hat Enterprise Linux for development, test, and production environments streamlines time to launch for new applications and reduces the risk of incompatibilities and issues at launch. Red Hat Enterprise Linux delivers access to reliable OS images in the cloud as well as the toolchains, libraries, container tools, and runtimes needed to streamline the path from development to production. Updates are delivered via application streams, allowing developers and IT architects to experiment with the latest tools, runtime languages, and databases while still maintaining earlier versions of production applications. 

Red Hat also offers developer-specific resources, programs, and subscriptions to help organizations develop on Red Hat Enterprise Linux more readily and cost-effectively: 

• Red Hat Developer program
• Red Hat Developer Subscription for Individuals
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Business Developers
• Red Hat Developer Subscription for Teams 

According to Flexera, enterprises consider a lack of resources or expertise a top cloud challenge.¹ The CentOS Project does not offer commercial support for CentOS Linux users, so you have likely been handling all platform support issues in-house, requiring more time and staff to operate.

Regardless of how you purchase Red Hat Enterprise Linux, you are backed by Red Hat’s award-winning support organization in coordination with your cloud provider’s support team. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is the only Linux distribution supported by Red Hat. Red Hat works with cloud partners to provide expertise, knowledge, and, in some cases, joint support models to ensure you can successfully accomplish your goals with Red Hat solutions. You receive the same high-value experience whether you obtain Red Hat Enterprise Linux directly from Red Hat or through your cloud provider.

Red Hat’s enterprise support resources and tools help keep your business running. Technical expertise, guidance, and knowledge—including collaboration with specialty teams by phone or chat—are available 24x7. Red Hat also offers personalized guidance and planning services to help you achieve your business outcomes faster. As a result, you can spend less time solving support issues and refocus staff on more strategic tasks. Accordingly, Red Hat Enterprise Linux users experience 72% less unplanned downtime than organizations that use unpaid Linux distributions.²

CentOS Linux does not include advanced management or remediation tools, so you probably manage these systems manually or with other in-house administration tools. Standardizing on Red Hat Enterprise Linux streamlines your operations and management. You can use the same set of management tools—like Red Hat Lightspeed (formerly Red Hat Insights), Red Hat Satellite, and Red Hat Ansible® Automation Platform—to administer and automate all of your environments, saving time and effort. 

Red Hat Enterprise Linux includes access to Red Hat Lightspeed, which can boost your subscription with AI-powered management and advanced security capabilities. Gain visibility into business, operations, and security risks to proactively identify and mitigate issues across your infrastructure–before they affect your bottom line.

Red Hat Lightspeed works across on-site and cloud environments, allowing you to manage and optimize everything from a single interface. You can also create, manage, and deploy Red Hat Enterprise Linux OS images across hybrid cloud environments more readily using the included image builder service. Build customized Red Hat Enterprise Linux images, save them as templates, and push them to multiple cloud provider inventories. Finally, to further simplify operations, you can link your Red Hat account to your cloud provider account and choose to automatically connect your cloud-based systems and workloads to Red Hat Lightspeed and other Red Hat services upon provisioning.

Security remains a top cloud challenge for enterprises.1 And effectively maintaining security and compliance in the cloud requires consistency. CentOS Linux does not include advanced security management tools and carries no governmental or public security certifications.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux provides built-in security features, security certifications, and simpler ways to maintain compliance. A dedicated security team, scanning and remediation software, and ongoing access to new resources help you ensure continuous compliance. Automated security tools, regular updates and patch releases, and accessible expertise safeguard your environment. Certification to key security standards—including Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2 and 140-3, Common Criteria (CC), and Secure Technical Implementation Guidelines (STIG)—lets you use Red Hat Enterprise Linux across use cases with confidence. 

All active Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscriptions also include access to live kernel patches for critical and important Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) at no extra cost. Plus, Red Hat Lightspeed lets you create Secure Content Automation Protocol (SCAP) policies, scan your systems for CVEs, and access remediation guidance using a single interface. Finally, best practice-based default settings configure critical systems for increased security in your cloud environment from the start.

Managing cloud spend is a top cloud challenge for enterprises.1 Red Hat offers multiple purchasing options to align with your organization’s budget and requirements: 

• Purchase subscriptions from Red Hat and use them on site or via Red Hat Cloud Access.
• Obtain Red Hat Enterprise Linux instances from your cloud providers’ consoles or marketplaces.
• Use your cloud provider committed spend programs and discounts for Red Hat Enterprise Linux cloud instances.
• Use the Red Hat Hybrid Committed Spend program for discounted pricing and flexible payment options across cloud providers.

Red Hat offers several migration paths and programs to ease your transition to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The Convert2RHEL tool lets you convert CentOS Linux systems directly into Red Hat Enterprise Linux systems. This user-friendly tool minimizes costly redeployment projects and reduces administrative burdens by maintaining existing OS customizations, configurations, and preferences during conversion. 

You can also accelerate your migration by engaging with Red Hat Consulting. Red Hat experts bring proven knowledge and experience to your migration project to help you identify and convert key applications and workloads and mentor your team to continue confidently afterward. 

The discontinuation of CentOS Linux provided an opportunity to move to an OS that better supports your cloud initiatives. Red Hat Enterprise Linux delivers an intelligent, production-grade foundation for hybrid and multicloud environments. 

Choose your path forward at red.ht/centos.