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April 22, 2024

CentOS vs. Ubuntu: Feature Comparison and Use Cases

Lance Dillon
Lance Dillon

Operating Systems

The last community supported version of CentOS Linux, CentOS 7, became end of life on June 30, 2024. But is Ubuntu a good CentOS alternative? 

That's the question we'll explore as we compare CentOS vs. Ubuntu in this blog. We'll consider features, support, security, packages, and use cases. 

Editor's Note: This blog was originally published on July 15, 2020 and was updated for accuracy and republished on April 22, 2024. 

Table of Contents

  1. What's the Difference Between CentOS vs. Ubuntu?
  2. CentOS History 
  3. Ubuntu History
  4. CentOS vs. Ubuntu: 5 Key Differences
  5. CentOS vs. Ubuntu: Use Cases 
  6. Can You Migrate From CentOS to Ubuntu?
  7. Final Thoughts
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What's the Difference Between CentOS vs. Ubuntu?

The main difference between CentOS vs. Ubuntu is where the distribution comes from. CentOS is sourced from Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) whereas Ubuntu is based on Debian architecture. 

Support is another key difference: As of June 30, 2024, all versions of CentOS Linux are end of life, whereas Ubuntu is still supported by the community. Ubuntu versions come with a five-year support lifecycle, with the community providing hardware and maintenance updates for two years, followed by a three-year period of only maintenance, or security, updates. 

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CentOS History 

The story of CentOS actually starts with Red Hat and RHEL. Red Hat’s first Linux distribution, Red Hat Linux (RHL), was released in 1995, with Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) following in 2000. RHL was discontinued in 2003 and merged with the Fedora Project to create Fedora. 

CentOS was created from RHEL 2.1AS in 2004. All the Red Hat branding was removed and replaced with CentOS. CentOS is generally compatible with RH software, and anything that will run on RHEL will run on CentOS. CentOS tracks RHEL at usually a one to two month lag and seems to target the server, or enterprise, market.

CentOS Stream

With Red Hat discontinuing CentOS Linux and shifting focus to CentOS Stream, CentOS Stream vs. Ubuntu will be the more valid comparison going forward. CentOS 6 and 8 are already end of life (EOL), and CentOS 7 EOL is on June 30, 2024.

CentOS Stream operates upstream from RHEL, meaning it's not a 1:1 drop-in replacement for RHEL. For organizations who are ready to accommodate rolling releases and the benefits they can offer, CentOS Stream will be a viable option.

CentOS Derivatives 

The CentOS 8 lifecycle was unexpectedly cut short and the EOL date was moved up 8 years ahead of schedule. As a result, several new open source Linux projects sprouted up, most notably Rocky Linux and AlmaLinux. These distributions were created to ensure that the CentOS community would have free downstream RHEL options and not be forced to pay for a commercial subscription if they could not make the switch to a rolling release distribution like CentOS Stream. 

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Ubuntu History

Ubuntu's history can be traced back to Debian, which started in 1993, with the first stable version released in 1996. Ubuntu was first released in 2004. Ubuntu packages are based on packages from Debian’s unstable branch, but are not necessarily binary compatible. So they may need to be rebuilt to be used on Ubuntu. Ubuntu tends to be more desktop-oriented than CentOS. 

Ubuntu Derivatives 

There are several derivatives based on Ubuntu that some argue provide a better user experience than CentOS derivatives, such as Linux Mint, elementary OS, along with the Ubuntu variations like Lubuntu and Kubuntu. 

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CentOS vs. Ubuntu: 5 Key Differences

When comparing CentOS vs. Ubuntu, there are five main areas of difference worth considering. 

1. Support

While both Ubuntu and CentOS are free, support beyond what the community provides is an extra service that can be purchased. Ubuntu is backed by Canonical, which means you can buy support contracts or partner with a third party like OpenLogic for SLA-backed Ubuntu support. CentOS has no official backing, but there are third parties that provide long-term CentOS support, such as OpenLogic. CentOS 7 support from the community stopped in June 2024, so teams with EOL CentOS deployments need to either patch in-house or partner with a vendor to get CentOS patches. 

2. Servers

CentOS Linux is widely used across the internet for servers. CentOS/RHEL is the basis for Amazon Linux and its cloud offering. Ubuntu is more often used for desktops; see more details in the Use Cases section below. 

3. Security 

CentOS is updated infrequently, usually with security and bug fixes for every major version. Each major version is typically supported for 10 years from the date of release (based on the RHEL schedule). This is because of the extensive testing in each release. However, Red Hat moved up the EOL date for CentOS 8 in order to shift its focus to CentOS Stream. 

Ubuntu is updated every six months. The support lifecycle is five years. Because of this, the software tends to be more recent but less stable (as is often the case with newer software). 

4. System 

Both CentOS and Ubuntu are Linux distributions, meaning much of the core operating system is the same. That being said, there are some management tool differences.

Manipulating network interfaces in CentOS and Ubuntu are done with the same tools (ip, ifconfig, etc.) and both distributions have created helper programs to make managing those interfaces easier. However, the specific tools are different between the distributions. Thus, there is some distribution-specific knowledge that is not easily transferable between the two.

5. Packaging 

CentOS uses the RPM package format. A program called rpm is used to manage packages. A front-end tool called yum (updated to dnf in CentOS 8) was created to manage network repositories, dependencies, and other combinations of actions.

Ubuntu uses the DEB package format. It uses a tool called apt (which is layered on top of apt-cache, apt-get, and dpkg) to manage DEB packages, just like yum/dnf is layered on top of rpm.

Both of these tools manage interactions between packages, allowing you to just use the one tool to do most things. Very rarely will you need to use the underlying programs to manage packages.

There may also be differences in availability of packages for each of the distributions. Some vendors may only provide a package for Ubuntu or CentOS/RHEL. This may influence one's choice of which distribution to use. With containers, this may not be as big of an issue as it used to be, since a container can be created with packages of one distribution and run on another. 

Software may also be named and managed different differently. Different distributions may use different tools and packaging methods to manage software, along with naming conventions. For example, on Ubuntu, apache is called apache2 and uses some special scripts to manage virtual hosts and websites. On CentOS, it is called httpd, and manages the configuration differently.

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CentOS vs. Ubuntu: Use Cases 

Since Ubuntu leans towards cutting-edge features and frequent updates, this makes it more suitable to developers and desktop users. With the latest in programming tools and libraries and the newest features, it tends to be preferred among desktop users and developers.

On the other hand, CentOS (and its derivatives) focuses more on stability and long-term support, making it ideal for servers and enterprise environments where support and predictable updates are desirable.

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Can You Migrate From CentOS to Ubuntu?

You may be able to migrate from CentOS to Ubuntu, depending on your applications. However, if the application you are running does not have a package or installation for Ubuntu, it may not be possible, or the migration would be very difficult.

Keep in mind that a migration from CentOS to Ubuntu is really a rebuild. The process to migrate entails backing up all your data, rebuilding the server with Ubuntu, installing the same applications, and then copying and importing the data.

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Final Thoughts

There are a number of CentOS migration paths to explore that may be less complicated than switching to Ubuntu. If you're standing up a new system, Ubuntu (or one of its derivatives) could be a good fit depending on your business goals.   

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