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  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Infrastructure as a Service
  4. Operating Systems
  5. Centos vs Fedora vs openSUSE

Centos vs Fedora vs openSUSE

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

CentOS
CentOS
Stacks13.8K
Followers9.0K
Votes53
openSUSE
openSUSE
Stacks111
Followers160
Votes13
Fedora
Fedora
Stacks623
Followers515
Votes97

Centos vs Fedora vs openSUSE: What are the differences?

Introduction

In the realm of Linux operating systems, CentOS, Fedora, and openSUSE are popular choices. Despite all being derived from Red Hat Linux, they serve different purposes and have distinct characteristics. Below are key differences between CentOS, Fedora, and openSUSE.

  1. Release Cycle: CentOS has a longer release cycle than Fedora and openSUSE, with major updates every few years. Fedora follows a rapid release cycle, providing bleeding-edge features and updates every six months. OpenSUSE offers a regular release cycle with a new version approximately every eight months, focusing on stability and user-friendliness.

  2. Target Audience: CentOS is geared towards enterprise users and servers, providing a stable and reliable platform for critical applications. Fedora is designed for developers and enthusiasts who crave the latest features and technologies, making it a great testing ground for future Red Hat Enterprise Linux releases. OpenSUSE targets both desktop and server users, offering a balance between cutting-edge software and a stable environment.

  3. Package Management: CentOS and Fedora use the YUM (Yellowdog Updater Modified) package manager, while openSUSE utilizes Zypper. Both YUM and Zypper are robust package management tools, but they have different commands and package repositories. CentOS and Fedora also support the DNF (Dandified YUM) package manager as an alternative to YUM.

  4. Default Desktop Environment: CentOS and Fedora default to GNOME, which is a popular, intuitive, and user-friendly desktop environment. On the other hand, openSUSE offers users a choice between GNOME, KDE Plasma, and several other desktop environments during the installation process, catering to diverse user preferences.

  5. Support Lifecycle: CentOS is known for its long-term support (LTS) releases, guaranteeing stability and security updates for up to ten years. Fedora, being more of a bleeding-edge distribution, only provides updates for a limited period after each release, typically around one year. openSUSE offers a dual approach with regular releases receiving updates for 18 months and long-term support versions getting support for up to 36 months.

  6. Community and Documentation: CentOS has a strong community of enterprise-focused professionals and extensive documentation tailored to server administration. Fedora has a vibrant community of developers and enthusiasts who actively contribute to the project and provide excellent documentation for experimental features. openSUSE boasts a friendly community that is welcoming to both beginners and experienced users, offering comprehensive documentation and guides for desktop and server configurations.

In Summary, the key differences between CentOS, Fedora, and openSUSE lie in their release cycles, target audiences, package management systems, default desktop environments, support lifecycles, and community focus.

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Advice on CentOS, openSUSE, Fedora

Jerome/Zen
Jerome/Zen

Software Engineer

Aug 2, 2020

Decided

Global familiarity, free, widely used, and as a debian distro feels more comfortable when rapidly switching between local macOS and remote command lines.

CentOS does boast quite a few security/stability improvements, however as a RHEL-based distro, differs quite significantly in the command line and suffers from slightly less frequent package updates. (Could be a good or bad thing depending on your use-case and if it is public facing)

271k views271k
Comments
Jaron
Jaron

CTO at DDVTech B.V.

Aug 27, 2020

Decided

Using Arch Linux for our systems and servers means getting the latest technology and fixes early, as well as early warnings for potential future breakage in other (slower) distributions. It's been easy to maintain, easy to automate, and most importantly: easy to debug.

While our software target is every recent Linux distribution, using Arch internally ensured that everyone understands the full system without any knowledge gaps.

37.1k views37.1k
Comments
Michael
Michael

Sep 25, 2020

Decided

I have used libvirt in every Linux hypervisor deployment I do. I frequently deploy RHEL or CentOS hypervisor servers with libvirt as the VMM of choice. It's installable via the guided setup for EL-based Linux distros, it uses minimal resources and overhead, integrates seamlessly with KVM and Qemu, and provides powerful CLI for advanced users and experts looking for automated deployments, or via VirtManager in your favorite Linux desktop environment. Best used with Linux VMs, it allows KVM and QEMU direct hardware virtualization access.

36.3k views36.3k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

CentOS
CentOS
openSUSE
openSUSE
Fedora
Fedora

The CentOS Project is a community-driven free software effort focused on delivering a robust open source ecosystem. For users, we offer a consistent manageable platform that suits a wide variety of deployments. For open source communities, we offer a solid, predictable base to build upon, along with extensive resources to build, test, release, and maintain their code.

The openSUSE project is a worldwide effort that promotes the use of Linux everywhere. openSUSE creates one of the world's best Linux distributions, working together in an open, transparent and friendly manner as part of the worldwide Free and Open Source Software community.

Fedora is a Linux-based operating system that provides users with access to the latest free and open source software, in a stable, secure and easy to manage form. Fedora is the largest of many free software creations of the Fedora Project. Because of its predominance, the word "Fedora" is often used interchangeably to mean both the Fedora Project and the Fedora operating system.

Statistics
Stacks
13.8K
Stacks
111
Stacks
623
Followers
9.0K
Followers
160
Followers
515
Votes
53
Votes
13
Votes
97
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 16
    Stable
  • 9
    Reliable
  • 9
    Free to use
  • 6
    Has epel packages
  • 6
    Good support
Cons
  • 1
    Yum is a horrible package manager
Pros
  • 4
    Stable
  • 3
    Lightweight for server
  • 2
    Reliable
  • 2
    Rolling release
  • 2
    Snapshot
Pros
  • 23
    Great for developers
  • 10
    Great integration with system tools
  • 10
    Good release schedule
  • 10
    Represents the future of rhel/centos
  • 8
    Reliable
Cons
  • 3
    Bugs get fixed slowly from kernel side
  • 2
    Boring
  • 2
    Systemd
  • 2
    Much less support from Wiki
  • 1
    Less packages in official repository

What are some alternatives to CentOS, openSUSE, Fedora?

Ubuntu

Ubuntu

Ubuntu is an ancient African word meaning ‘humanity to others’. It also means ‘I am what I am because of who we all are’. The Ubuntu operating system brings the spirit of Ubuntu to the world of computers.

Debian

Debian

Debian systems currently use the Linux kernel or the FreeBSD kernel. Linux is a piece of software started by Linus Torvalds and supported by thousands of programmers worldwide. FreeBSD is an operating system including a kernel and other software.

Arch Linux

Arch Linux

A lightweight and flexible Linux distribution that tries to Keep It Simple.

Linux Mint

Linux Mint

The purpose of Linux Mint is to produce a modern, elegant and comfortable operating system which is both powerful and easy to use.

Linux

Linux

A clone of the operating system Unix, written from scratch by Linus Torvalds with assistance from a loosely-knit team of hackers across the Net. It aims towards POSIX and Single UNIX Specification compliance.

CoreOS

CoreOS

It is designed for security, consistency, and reliability. Instead of installing packages via yum or apt, it uses Linux containers to manage your services at a higher level of abstraction. A single service's code and all dependencies are packaged within a container that can be run on one or many machines.

Gentoo Linux

Gentoo Linux

It is a free operating system based on either Linux or FreeBSD that can be automatically optimized and customized for just about any application or need.

Alpine Linux

Alpine Linux

Alpine Linux is a security-oriented, lightweight Linux distribution based on musl libc and busybox.

Manjaro

Manjaro

It is an accessible, friendly, open-source Linux distribution and community. Based on Arch Linux, it provides all the benefits of cutting-edge software combined with a focus on getting started quickly, automated tools to require less manual intervention, and help readily available when needed.

FreeBSD

FreeBSD

An operating system for a variety of platforms which focuses on features, speed, and stability. It is derived from BSD, the version of UNIX® developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It is developed and maintained by a large community.

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