ClearScale Ubuntu 26.04 LTS Reviews

I am using this for running containerized workloads on AWS EC2.

The CIS Level 1 hardening out of the box saves significant time. There is no need to run custom hardening scripts after provisioning. AppArmor profiles, kernel sysctl tuning, and restricted unprivileged user namespaces are all pre-configured, which is exactly what compliance-conscious teams need.

The pre-applied CIS L1 benchmark is the main selling point. Getting a hardened baseline without manual effort is genuinely useful. The Ubuntu 26.04 LTS base also means I'm on a supported, up-to-date kernel with long-term security patches.

The CIS L1 AppArmor enforcement breaks Docker out of the box. Containers fail to start with a permission denied on the containerd task directory. There is no documentation about this. A simple note explaining that Docker users need to either update the runc AppArmor profile or disable it would save a lot of debugging time. It takes a while to trace the failure back to AppArmor blocking runc writes to /run/containerd/.

I have been using it for 10 days.

We were using the standard Ubuntu 24.04 LTS AMI from Canonical and handling hardening ourselves through custom scripts and Ansible playbooks. We switched to this to reduce provisioning overhead and get a consistent, pre-hardened baseline across instances without maintaining our own hardening pipeline.

The pricing is reasonable given that you're essentially paying for the hardening work and support rather than just the OS.

We looked at the CIS-hardened AMIs from AWS directly and a couple of other Marketplace offerings. We chose this one because of the Clearscale support backing and the Ubuntu LTS base, which fits better with our existing tooling and team familiarity.

If you plan to run Docker, be aware that the CIS L1 AppArmor enforcement will block containers from starting out of the box. The runc AppArmor profile restricts writes to the containerd task directory, which causes container creation to fail silently with a permission error. You'll need to either update the runc AppArmor profile to allow the required paths or disable it and apply a Docker-compatible profile. It would be great if the documentation covered this.

I run a fleet of stateless web and API servers behind an Application Load Balancer in an Auto Scaling Group. ClearScale Ubuntu 26.04 LTS is our standard base image for those instances, serving customer-facing web traffic and internal REST APIs that need to scale out and in throughout the day.

It gave us one consistent, hardened golden image across the whole fleet, which removed the configuration drift we used to see when each team baked its own AMI. New instances join the load balancer already patched and locked down, so scale-out events no longer introduce inconsistent or unhardened nodes. That consistency has made our deployments more predictable and cut down the time we spend reconciling instance state.

The biggest value is that the security baseline is already in place when the instance boots. With root SSH disabled, password authentication off, and the firewall defaulting to deny, our app servers start in a known-good state without us layering on a hardening step at launch. The pre-installed AWS Systems Manager agent is also a standout. We manage the entire fleet through Session Manager, so we no longer run a bastion host or distribute SSH keys to the team. The lean build, with snapd and unused packages removed, keeps boot times short, which matters when an Auto Scaling Group is adding nodes under load.

Because the firewall ships default-deny, the first launch in a new environment takes a little planning to open the exact ports the app and load balancer health checks need. Clearer documentation of the default rules would smooth that out. I'd also like a slimmer variant aimed specifically at stateless app servers, and more detailed per-version release notes so we can see exactly what changed between builds. Built-in observability hooks out of the box would be a nice addition.

I have been running ClearScale Ubuntu 26.04 LTS in production for a little over nine months. Our team has used Ubuntu in general for more than ten years.

We previously launched the stock Canonical Ubuntu AMI and ran our own hardening scripts after boot. We switched to ClearScale's Ubuntu image so the hardening is already baked in and maintained for us, which removed a fragile post-launch step from our scaling workflow.

The hourly software charge is small relative to the engineering time we used to spend building and maintaining our own hardened AMI. If you run a fleet of any size, look at the total cost of ownership. The saved maintenance and audit-prep time has been worth it for us.

We looked at staying on the stock Ubuntu AMI with our own automation, Ubuntu Pro, and maintaining an internally built golden image. We chose the ClearScale hardened image because it gave us the CIS-aligned baseline we wanted without us owning the hardening pipeline.

Plan your security group and firewall rules before the first launch so health checks and app ports are open from the start, then bake the image into your launch template. After that one-time setup, it has been a quiet, reliable foundation for our autoscaling fleet.

My primary use case is hosting cloud-native applications, web services, APIs, containerized workloads, and development environments running on public cloud infrastructure.

ClearScale Ubuntu 26.04 LTS has improved our operational efficiency by providing a stable and familiar Linux platform with long-term support.

The distribution integrates well with modern cloud services and DevOps tooling, allowing our teams to deploy and manage applications more efficiently.

The long-term support (LTS) lifecycle provides stability and predictable maintenance.

There are extensive package repositories and software availability.

It also offers strong cloud platform integration and automation support. Additionally, there is excellent container and Kubernetes ecosystem compatibility. Frequent security updates and straightforward package management further enhance its value.

Enterprise management and compliance tooling could be more comprehensive out of the box.

Some advanced security and monitoring capabilities still require additional configuration or third-party solutions.

Enhanced built-in observability and monitoring tools are needed. More integrated security compliance reporting, improved cloud cost optimization recommendations, and additional AI-assisted system administration and troubleshooting features would be beneficial.

I have been using ClearScale Ubuntu 26.04 LTS for approximately three months across development, testing, and production environments.

We previously used CentOS-based systems.

We switched to Ubuntu LTS because of its predictable release cycle, broad community support, strong cloud ecosystem, and long-term maintenance commitments.

Ubuntu LTS offers strong value due to its combination of enterprise-grade stability and relatively low operational costs.

Organizations should evaluate support requirements and infrastructure scale when comparing costs against commercial enterprise Linux distributions.

We evaluated Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux, and Debian before selecting Ubuntu 26.04 LTS.

ClearScale Ubuntu 26.04 LTS is an excellent choice for organizations adopting cloud-native technologies and modern DevOps practices.

Its ease of use, large ecosystem, and long-term support make it suitable for both growing teams and large-scale enterprise deployments.

I run a bunch of stateless REST APIs and web apps in AWS behind an Application Load Balancer. Everything lives in Auto Scaling Groups (ASGs). I use this AMI as the default base for those instances so they can scale up or down during traffic spikes without me worrying about security drift.

It basically stopped configuration drift for me. Before, different development teams would bake their own slightly different AMIs, which was a nightmare for security audits. Now, I have a single, pre-hardened baseline. When ASGs scale out, I know the new instances are already patched and locked down. It's made my deployments way more predictable and saved my platform team a ton of babysitting time.

The best part is that it's secure the second it boots. Having root SSH disabled, passwords off, and the firewall set to deny-all by default means I don't have to layer on a massive post-launch hardening script. Another huge plus is the pre-installed AWS Systems Manager (SSM) agent. I manage the whole fleet via Session Manager now, which allowed me to completely tear down my old bastion hosts and stop managing SSH keys. Also, they actually stripped out snapd and a bunch of other bloatware, which keeps the boot times really fast. This is super critical when my autoscaling groups are trying to spin up instances under heavy load.

It would be cool to have more detailed changelogs with each new release so I can see exactly what packages got updated without having to boot up a test instance and diff it myself.

I have been running ClearScale Ubuntu Linux in production for a little over nine months.

I used to spin up the stock Canonical Ubuntu AMIs and run a massive bash script during cloud-init to lock them down. It was slow, fragile, and I had to constantly maintain the script as Ubuntu evolved. I switched to this AMI to get that hardening out-of-the-box, which made my scaling workflows much faster and less prone to failures.

The hourly premium is honestly negligible compared to the salary hours I was wasting building, patching, and maintaining my own custom images. If you have a decent-sized fleet, look at the total cost of ownership.

I considered a few routes: sticking with the standard stock AMI and building a Packer pipeline, upgrading to Ubuntu Pro, or maintaining my own custom golden images. I went with ClearScale Ubuntu because I just didn't want the long-term maintenance burden. I wanted a CIS-aligned baseline but didn't want to build or run the pipelines myself.

Just make sure you map out your firewall and port requirements beforehand so your load balancer health checks don't fail on day one. Once you get that launch template dialed in, the image is incredibly solid. It's been a very quiet, set-and-forget baseline for my production environment.

Boilerplate security comes out of the box, reducing the need for manual setup.

Having additional security brings peace of mind.

The same-day engineering support has been very valuable.

I have no complaints so far.

I have been using the solution for one week.

I have tried out competitor products but switched here because of better support.

The setup cost is cheaper than the market average.

Alternate solutions were considered.

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