CentOS Stream
Continuously delivered distro that tracks just ahead of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) development, positioned as a midstream between Fedora Linux and RHEL.
Overview
CentOS Stream is the current official CentOS platform — a rolling-release Linux distribution positioned between Fedora and RHEL.
Purpose: Public development space for future RHEL minor releases
Model: Continuous delivery (no point releases)
Key facts
| Topic | Fact |
|---|---|
| Status | Active (CentOS Stream 9 & 10) |
| Support | ~1–2 years per version (tied to RHEL minor) |
| Updates | Daily/weekly packages |
| RHEL Compatibility | Binary identical to upcoming RHEL minor versions |
| Use Cases | Cloud, CI/CD, containers, RHEL preview |
| EOL | Stream 9 → May 2027 / Stream 10 → active |
Ecosystem position
Fedora → CentOS Stream → RHEL (next minor)
Not a beta - production-ready. Used in production by: AWS, Azure, GCP, Facebook, Verizon.
Quick start
Migrate from CentOS Linux 8:
sudo dnf swap centos-linux-repos centos-stream-repos
sudo dnf distro-sync
Containers: quay.io/centos/centos:stream10