Ten major differences between RHEL8 and RHEL9

RHEL9 Offers

Discover the major differences between RHEL 8 and RHEL 9 and review the latest version’s enhancements in performance, security, and containerization support. RHEL 9 introduces significant improvements, making it an exciting and compelling choice for Linux professionals aiming to stay current with the latest features and capabilities.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is a popular enterprise Linux distribution used by many organizations around the world. RHEL 8 was released in May 2019, while RHEL 9 was released in May 2021. Here are ten ways in which RHEL 9 differs from RHEL 8.

RHEL9 Offerings: Kernel Version

One of the most significant differences between RHEL 8 and RHEL 9 is the kernel version. RHEL 8 uses the 4.18 kernel, while RHEL 9 uses the 5.4 kernel. The newer kernel provides better performance and improved security features.

RHEL9 offers

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Improved Performance and Scalability

RHEL 9 offers improved performance and scalability compared to RHEL 8. This is due to the inclusion of new features such as Control Groups v2 (cgroupsv2) and eBPF (extended Berkeley Packet Filter). These features allow for better resource management and monitoring, making it easier to manage large-scale deployments.

Enhanced Security

RHEL 9 includes several new security features that were not available in RHEL 8. These features include Kernel Runtime Guard (KRG), which protects the kernel against tampering and exploitation, and System Roles, which enable administrators to implement best practices for security configuration.

Containerization

Containerization is becoming increasingly popular, and RHEL 9 provides better support for containerization than RHEL 8. The newer version includes Podman, a tool for managing containers without requiring a container daemon, as well as Buildah, a tool for building container images.

Programming Languages

RHEL 9 includes newer versions of popular programming languages such as Python 3.9, Ruby 3.0, and Node.js 14. These updated versions offer better performance, security, and developer productivity.

System-wide crypto policies

RHEL 9 provides a new framework for managing cryptographic policies across the system, making it easier to enforce consistent security policies for cryptography.

Improved support for ARM architecture

RHEL 9 includes improvements for the ARM architecture, including support for 64-bit ARM (aarch64) and better performance on ARM-based systems.

Better integration with cloud-native environments

RHEL 9 includes improvements to containerization and orchestration, making it easier to deploy and manage applications in cloud-native environments such as Kubernetes.

Simplified management of system roles

RHEL 9 introduces a new System Role Management Tool that simplifies the process of managing system roles, making it easier to ensure systems are configured according to best practices.

New tools for performance monitoring and analysis

RHEL 9 includes new tools such as perf-annotate and perf-diff, which provide better visibility into system performance and make it easier to analyze and troubleshoot performance issues.

Conclusion

RHEL 9 offers several improvements over RHEL 8, including a newer kernel version, improved performance and scalability, enhanced security features, better containerization support, and updated programming languages. A detailed accounting of new RHEL9 features can be found on the official Red Hat Website. These features make RHEL 9 an excellent choice for enterprise Linux users who require the latest and greatest features and capabilities.

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