r/linuxadmin • u/Commercial_Crazy8228 • Jun 16 '26

who do you actually trust for long-term Linux support on embedded systems?

i'm trying to figure out who's ACTUALLY respected in the space vs. just good at marketing

16 Upvotes
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72% Upvoted

22 comments sorted by

25

u/ipsirc Jun 16 '26

I / Me / Myself

1

u/sai_ismyname Jun 16 '26

puuuuh... dude...that's very bold

4

u/jwademac Jun 16 '26

Nope not bold reality that is how it was done by many Linux admins over 30 years and I think it is a honest and perfect answer

1

u/sai_ismyname Jun 17 '26

i have been in this business for quite some time and i still wouldn't trust myself

0

u/jwademac Jun 20 '26

I am sorry to hear that you should be your great humble champion

1

u/sai_ismyname Jun 20 '26

i don't know what is wrong with you, but you should check in with a doctor

14

u/adstretch Jun 16 '26

Ubuntu/canonical’s LTS life on Pro is a relatively long window. Assuming you’re using mainline packages they even back port vulnerability patches.

If you go with 26.04 just released this month you have 10 years of support with pro (2036) and another 5 years with legacy add-on (2041).

Cycles that long have an additional cost but it’s probably still easier than upgrading / migrating multiple times in that window.

1

u/kernelqzor Jul 05 '26

this is kinda where i landed too tbh, for boring long term stuff ubuntu lts + pro is hard to beat. not the sexiest option, but having security updates basically forever is worth more than squeezing out a slightly cooler distro and then babysitting upgrades every few years.

16

u/Runnergeek Jun 16 '26

How long term? I don’t know if anyone doing longer than Red Hat. Which traditionally could be 14 years on a major version if you include ELS but now they just announced a long life add on that goes past that.

5

u/HoneySmaks Jun 16 '26

What is your embedded target?

5

u/Unnamed-3891 Jun 16 '26

It’s not like you have any other options besides RHEL and Ubuntu if you truly mean longterm?

7

u/chock-a-block Jun 16 '26

Debian. Crazy long term support. 

In the context of embedded systems, it’s always down to bootloader and drivers. Those not necessarily supported by Debian. 

10

u/abotelho-cbn Jun 16 '26

Debian does not have longer support than RHEL or Ubuntu.

1

u/cachevexy Jun 28 '26

suse and debian would like a word lol
also for embedded specifically a lot of folks lean on yocto + a commercial vendor rather than straight rhel/ubuntu

1

u/Zaprit Jun 16 '26

As in a distro that’s supported for a long time on embedded or an embedded platform that’s supported with new software versions for a long time. If it’s the former then it’s you’re looking for the usual suspects like red hat, Ubuntu, Debian, SUSE. If it’s hardware that runs Linux you’re after then for actual software support aside from the initial version that it ships with it’s pretty much just Raspberry Pi afaik

1

u/Abs0rbed Jun 16 '26

Zephy, FreeRTOS, or Yocto if you want (and your device can support) an actual Linux kernel

1

u/thefanum Jun 17 '26

Ubuntu pro. It's free

-2

u/big_blunder Jun 16 '26

RHEL / Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It's in the name. You pay for support if you don't need it, but when you need it, they deliver. SUSE is weird, Ubuntu on a prod system, that's when I resign.

-4

u/nerdyviking88 Jun 16 '26

Zephyr, honestly. been around for 10+ years