RHEL gold images in Azure and user experience improvements for Red Hat Cloud Access

Red Hat’s Cloud Access program is one of the ways that Red Hat helps its customers use their Red Hat subscriptions in the public cloud. In the last few weeks we’ve introduced significant enhancements and new features we don’t want you to miss, including self-service access to Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) gold images directly in Microsoft Azure, and a number of customer experience improvements. 

Azure Gold Images

As of Monday, January 13, Red Hat Cloud Access customers now have the ability to access RHEL gold images directly in Azure via your Azure Subscriptions tab in regions where the Azure Marketplace is available. Want to skip the hassle of creating and uploading gold images into the cloud? Red Hat and Microsoft heard that loud and clear! 

When new versions of Red Hat products, like RHEL, are available as Gold Images they will automatically be visible to your entitled Azure Subscription IDs (provided your active Red Hat subscriptions meet the eligibility criteria). The Azure Gold Images are certified by Red Hat and published by Microsoft. As with other Cloud Access subscriptions, Red Hat supports our customers using these images, so you keep your direct support relationship with Red Hat.

Documentation on enabling existing Red Hat subscriptions for Microsoft Azure is in the customer portal, in the Cloud Access Reference guide.

Customer Experience improvements

In December 2019 we announced some major changes to Cloud Access designed to improve the customer experience. These changes include:

The ability for customers to self-service using their eligible subscriptions on a public cloud or managed service provider. 

• An all new user interface integrated into the RHSM Customer Portal.

• Much improved subscription enablement process that replaces the former registration form.

• Ability for customers to add, view and manage their enabled subscriptions and cloud providers.

• Ability to view expiration dates for their enabled subscriptions.

• Tooltip guidance and links to documentation directly in the user interface.

We’ve also updated our “Red Hat in the Public Cloud” with more information about Red Hat Gold Images on Azure and other information on using Cloud Access.

Whether on premises or in the public cloud, Red Hat continues to work to improve customer experience and value from your subscriptions. To learn more about Cloud Access, check out our program overview. If you’re an existing Red Hat customer with active, unused subscriptions you can learn about activating Cloud Access in our customer portal.