Convert2RHEL: Move to Red Hat Enterprise Linux from other Linux distros

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Move from CentOS Linux®, Oracle Linux, Alma Linux, or Rocky Linux to Red Hat® Enterprise Linux with the convert2RHEL tool.

Evaluate your CentOS Linux migration options with a 6-question assessment to give immediate, personalized guidance for a smooth transition to Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Plan your migration

Convert2RHEL is a command line utility that analyzes your system’s readiness and converts RPM-based Linux operating systems (OS) to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It’s an automated way to standardize on Red Hat Enterprise Linux instead of manually redeploying all your workloads.

Convert2RHEL minimizes the need for costly redeployment projects and reduces administrative burden by maintaining existing OS customizations, configurations, and preferences during the conversion. 

Read the documentation

Why convert2RHEL?

The CentOS Project discontinued updates and releases of CentOS Linux® 7 on June 30, 2024. If you’re still running CentOS Linux, even if you manage to receive support from a vendor or other third party source, you’re at risk of exposing your organization to unpatched vulnerabilities and potential security breaches. This means current CentOS Linux users will need to choose a migration path. 

Read the CentOS migration information page

 

Convert2RHEL is just the start. Learn how it ties into Red Hat’s Third Party Linux Migration special offer. Video duration: 5:22.
 

Organizations migrating from CentOS Linux 7 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux now have a simpler way to convert using Red Hat Insights:

  1. Register CentOS Linux 7 systems to display in the Insights inventory list.
  2. Initiate a pre-conversion analysis of selected CentOS Linux 7 systems and receive remediation advice to help address issues that could complicate or prevent conversion to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. 
  3. Complete your conversion to Red Hat Enterprise Linux directly from Red Hat Insights after you resolve any issues identified in the pre-conversion analysis.

For an in-depth walkthrough, explore our step-by-step migration guidance.

For organizations who would like to migrate from other RPM-based Linux distributions or prefer to use the convert2RHEL command line tool to migrate to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, please see below for instructions and next steps. 

Red Hat resources

Identify a conversion path

Many users migrating from CentOS Linux 7 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux will convert to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 first. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 reached its End of Maintenance (EOM) period on June 30, 2024. After your systems have migrated to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, users have two options based on their migration plans:

  • Upgrade to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8. This can be done in-place or via a fresh install. Upgrading to the latest versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux allows users to extend their systems’ support and stability and take advantage of the newest features and benefits.
  • Not ready to upgrade?  Extended Life Cycle Support (ELS) for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 provides up to 4 additional years of maintenance support for certain critical-impact security fixes, selected urgent priority bug fixes, and troubleshooting for the last minor release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 (7.9) until June 30, 2028. 

Other supported conversion paths include:

  • CentOS Linux 8 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
  • Oracle Linux 7 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
  • Oracle Linux 8 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
  • Alma Linux 8 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
  • Rocky Linux 8 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
     

Conversions from CentOS Linux 6 and Oracle Linux 6 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux are unsupported—since Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 is outside the lifecycle maintenance phase—but guidance is provided in this documentation

Check out the cheat sheet for using Convert2RHEL to learn more.

Simplify conversions from CentOS Linux with tailored pathways

Prepare to convert

Read this documentation for guidance, additional features, and information on known limitations. Verify that your system is supported for conversion to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and then back it up. Use the documentation—which includes step-by-step instructions on how to assess system applications and data—to identify potential complications with workloads, configurations, or applications, and proactively remediate issues. Identify compatibility issues and layered applications prior to your migration in order to minimize risk and optimize the system. 

If challenges or complexities arise during this phase, reach out to Red Hat Consulting. These experts can help convert more complex applications and workloads, as well as help standardize processes, analyze workloads, and automate migration variants, all of which can help minimize risks associated with OS conversion.

Review the pre-conversion analysis report

To assess whether your systems can be converted to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, run the pre-conversion analysis. This generates a report that summarizes potential problems and suggests recommended solutions. The report also helps you decide whether it is possible or advisable to proceed with the conversion to Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Convert

After backing up your existing OS, run the convert2RHEL utility while following along with the documentation. Convert2RHEL will automatically identify and replace OS packages from your original Linux distribution with Red Hat Enterprise Linux equivalents, and convert2RHEL is officially supported to help troubleshoot conversion variants.

Once the conversion is successful, reboot the system into Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It may be necessary to reinstall third-party RPMs or reconfigure system services after conversion. 

Upgrade

If your system is running Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 after convert2RHEL has finished, take a moment to assess your support situation. If you took advantage of our Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Third Party Linux Migration offer or purchased an Extended Lifecycle Support (ELS) add-on subscription, then you have additional time to upgrade to a newer version. If you do not have either of these extended support options, we recommend upgrading to a newer, supported version, since Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 reached end of maintenance on June 30, 2024

Learn more about upgrading

Another tool that helps users expand their capabilities is Red Hat Developer Subscription for Teams. It allows existing Red Hat customer organizations, who are running Red Hat technologies in their production environments, the opportunity to deploy Red Hat Enterprise Linux at no extra cost. Red Hat Enterprise Linux gives developers easy access to a more reliable and security-focused operating system, allowing your organization to build and test applications on the same innovative and reliable platform used for your production workloads.

Learn more from the brief

Get back to work

Once the conversion and upgrade are complete, you have access to all the latest Red Hat Enterprise Linux updates—as well as all the performance, support, management, and security capabilities that Red Hat Enterprise Linux includes.

For more detailed notes about the conversion process, visit the technical documentation and Red Hat Knowledgebase.

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Why choose Red Hat for Linux?

Workloads need to be portable and scalable across environments. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is your consistent, stable foundation across hybrid cloud deployments.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux migration process

Upgrade to the latest major release, convert from other Linux distributions, or refactor from a non-Linux operating system.

What to know for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 End of Maintenance

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 reached its end of maintenance on June 30, 2024. Upgrade now.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux resources