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reviewer930072 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Engineer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Oct 23, 2021
Mostly stable and has a free community version but could be even more stable
Pros and Cons
  • "The product offers a free community-based version."
  • "The stability could always be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We primarily use the solution to build our applications. 

What is most valuable?

The solution is stable.

The product offers a free community-based version. You can also buy a license if you need to.

What needs improvement?

The platform already provides pretty great services. I'm not sure if it is missing any features.

The stability could always be improved.

For how long have I used the solution?

I occasionally use the solution. 

Buyer's Guide
CentOS
January 2026
Learn what your peers think about CentOS. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2026.
879,853 professionals have used our research since 2012.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable and the performance is good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is scalable, however, if you would like to expand, you may need to pay for a business license. 

in terms of administration, 20 to 30 people use the solution.

How are customer service and support?

I've never used technical support. If I need help, I can Google information to help troubleshoot. 

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We did not previously use another operating system. 

How was the initial setup?

The solution was very easy to install. The implementation process wasn't a problem at all. 

The deployment was fast. It maybe took one hour. 

I and another engineer handled the implementation together. You need two to three people to deploy the product.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

We are using the community version, which is free. 

What other advice do I have?

I'd rate the solution at a seven out of ten. For the most part, it's a good solution. I'd recommend it to others.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
reviewer1053252 - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Presales Consultant/ Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
MSP
Aug 5, 2021
Relegated to a test bench, and therefore is no longer stable
Pros and Cons
  • "CentOS is very efficient and very powerful with many capabilities."
  • "I was using CentOS because it was very stable, and now it's not."

What is our primary use case?

It can be used for data centers to run the servers.

CentOS is a test bench for Red Hat. When Red Hat is testing new software, they will test it out in CentOS and Fedora. They will give it to the public, the public will complain about all the issues, then they will fix it, and include it in Red Hat.

I am not using it for the organization. However, I am using it in the business. For example, I help many clients back up Linux servers or protect Linux servers. But I am a Linux user at home, and I have been implementing products that revolve around Linux.

What is most valuable?

CentOS was one of the best Linux distributions out there. There was no community-based operating system like CentOS, except for Red Hat.

CentOS is very efficient and very powerful with many capabilities.

Anyone who has been using CentOs from the beginning of time has been using it because it has been a stable platform. Many companies have made solutions based on CentOS because it was a stable platform.

What needs improvement?

Unfortunately, Red Hat has changed the direction of the project.

The community is shocked that CentOS is no longer that stable branch, it's that development branch. 

They have now started a new project that some vendors are involved with, which is called Rocky Linux. 

Rocky Linux is a new Linux distribution that continues with what the community started with CentOS. The community now is making creating their own CentOS, because of Red Hat's decision to make this CentOS a test bench.

Most of the vendors in the market right now are making appliances, whether it be a firewall or a storage appliance, and most of them are using CentOS. Imagine the impact this will have on the vendors, on an international level, because they are relying on CentOS to be the most stable Linux distribution, and they chose the solution based on stability.

Red Hat made the decision of making CentOS a test bench, which means it will no longer be stable. Vendors will either push the new unstable update to customers, which is not something they would likely do or they would need to change to another Linux distribution.

It's a major decision for many companies to make. Because it is now a test bench many people are forced to change.

I was using CentOS because it was very stable, and now it's not. Will I use it? No. 

The main reason people use CentOS was because of its stability. Now that the stability has been compromised, no one will use it, unless they are Red Hat developers. The people who are learning Red Hat will also like it. But for us, the community, who might have been relying on CentOS as being a very stable platform, we will discard it.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using CentOS for five years.

We used version CentOS 6, and CentOS 7, but the latest one is CentOS 8.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

CentOS had proven to be very stable, but now with the updates, CentOS is not the stable operating system that it used to be. 

How are customer service and technical support?

CentOS is not supported commercially. CentOS is a community project. If you have any issue, you open the forums online, you post about it, and they solve it for you. 

Red Hat is the one that is charging for it. You can buy Red Hat and purchase support from them and they'll support you.

How was the initial setup?

If you know your way around Linux, then it is easy to install CentOS.

Most of it is the command line. There is a graphical user interface installation, but if you know CentOS, you don't want to do anything with the graphics. Instead, you will want to do everything with the command line, otherwise, you should consider Ubuntu.

What about the implementation team?

I can install any Linux on my own, with no worries.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

There are no licensing fees for CentOS. It's a DPL project, there is no licensing cost.

What other advice do I have?

CentOS, Red Hat, Oracle Linux, and Fedora all share the same binaries, they have the exact same distribution, with very minor differences. 

CentOS started as a community project, a community enterprise operating system. It's basically free Red Hat. Red Hat was rebranded and called CentOS and released to the public.

I have had a really good experience with CentOS 6 or CentOS 7, but I have abandoned CentOS completely since Red Hat has made its position of CentOS very clear. CentOS now is discontinued. 

Red Hat is releasing CentOS Stream, which is new. Before, what used to be the situation? Red Hat would release the Red Hat Linux distribution online version six, for example, at the same time, Red Hat would release CentOS 6. Red Hat and CentOS 6 had no differences, except the fact that with Red Hat you can actually get a support contract, whereas, with CentOS 6, you cannot get a support contract. 

CentOS and Red Hat are the same. There's no difference between CentOS and Red Hat.

There used to be no difference between CentOS and Red Hat, but now CentOS is like Fedora.

There's no difference, it's just a test bench, with the latest updates, but it is not as stable as it is before.

Now, there was something called Fedora. Fedora is a Linux-based distribution. Usually, you have the latest updates, the brand new technologies, everything is in the Fedora, but it's not stable. Fedora is not stable.

Red Hat is the one controlling CentOS. Whenever Red Hat would release a version, they would release the same CentOS to the public. The only difference was that CentOS is supported by the community, and Red Hat is supported by Red Hat, the enterprise by the business. They used to have a test bench, which is Fedora. Fedora is a distribution based both on Red Hat or CentOS, but packages are very up to date, which is not stable. Now, Red Hat made a decision to stop CentOS and make something new called CentOS Stream. This CentOS Stream is just like Fedora.

It's not as stable as Red Hat. Before Red Hat was releasing a free version and a paid version. Both the free and the paid were the exact, same, they were identical, there were no differences. 

It has the same stability and the same everything. Now, CentOS is a test bench in which Red Hat releases the newest and latest code so that they can try it out on the community, to ensure that it is fine before they include it in Red Hat. CentOS is like Fedora. Good for testing, not for production, and not for servers.

For the time being, I would not recommend this solution to others. 

At one time CentOS was definitely a nine out of ten, but now with these recent updates, I would rate CentOS a zero out of ten. Imagine if you would create something for a specific purpose, but then in the middle, you would change it and make it the exact opposite. That would make any person who chose it, hate it.

I am very frustrated with the way the CentOS project has gone. I would rate it a Zero out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
CentOS
January 2026
Learn what your peers think about CentOS. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2026.
879,853 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Group DWH and BI Senior Manager at a wireless company with 201-500 employees
Real User
Jul 9, 2021
All of the features of Red Hat without the subscription fee
Pros and Cons
  • "It has all the features of Red Hat, but you don't have to pay for the subscription."
  • "Integration with other platforms could be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We use CentOS in conjunction with our applications and databases.

What is most valuable?

It's free — it's an open-source solution. It has all the features of Red Hat, but you don't have to pay for the subscription. Otherwise, it's pretty much the same as Red Hat Linux. It uses all of the same repositories, the only difference is that it's open-source.

What needs improvement?

Integration with other platforms could be improved. There should also be more repositories. There are ways to get data from the repositories, but it could be enhanced.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using CentOS since 2019.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Version 7 is stable — not the recent versions; I believe they have some issues. We are using a stable version as of now. We haven't faced any issues so far.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

CentOS is scalable.

How are customer service and technical support?

I have contacted their support, but it's not commercial technical support. On their website, there are blogs and other users that help. They have a large community that can answer most questions.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Before CentOS, we used Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The reason why we approached CentOS is that it has the same flavor, but there is no subscription. Earlier, we were paying for Red Hat Linux on a yearly subscription. In order to minimize the cost, especially for some of the applications, it didn't make sense to pay on a yearly basis. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is not very straightforward — it's intermediate. Linux is not an easy thing to install. If you don't have the knowledge, it can be a little difficult.

I believe there is a desktop version available that has a UI but we haven't tried it. That might be a little easier to install; but since it's on a server, we needed to use the command prompt.

What about the implementation team?

We installed it ourselves.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

There is no price or licensing required — it's open-source. 

What other advice do I have?

Overall, on a scale from one to ten, I would give this solution a rating of nine. 

I would definitely recommend this solution to others. Not the desktop version — I don't have experience with it. On a server level, I would definitely recommend it.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
reviewer1597158 - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Solutions Architect - International Projects at a media company with 501-1,000 employees
Real User
Jun 11, 2021
Lightweight, powerful, and stable
Pros and Cons
  • "The pricing is good. We pay a minimal fee."
  • "The solution is stable, however, it could always be even more stable if possible."

How has it helped my organization?

We just see it as an operating system to run our applications. We're in the media industry and we make a lot of TV programs and OTT items. We have developed backend applications that make, let's say, 10 locations happen or make OTT happen.

Everything is running on CentOS due to the fact that it's lightweight. It's not a huge overhead. It's not like Windows eating up a lot of CPU resources. 

What is most valuable?

The performance in the past, the open-source approach, has been great. 

It helps us with our internal applications for very low pricing.

All our applications internally have been running on CentOS since 2006 when I joined the company so we have been developing on things like that.

We use the solution due to the fact that it's a lightweight, powerful, stable OS. It's being used for a lot of different use cases. 

The stability is very good.

The pricing is good. We pay a minimal fee.

What needs improvement?

Often, the solution doesn't scale as you expect.

I cannot recall if there are features that need improvement or if there's anything that should be added.

For me, it just has to perform and carry our application. I don't really care about how the user interface looks like as we don't use the user interface. We have an application running on it and that needs to be stable and that's the only thing. Therefore, we have no issues with the solution and don't feel it's missing anything.

The solution is stable, however, it could always be even more stable if possible.

CentOS recently announced some changes. I'm not sure what they will be, however, we look forward to seeing what they come out with. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for about ten to 12 years or so. It's been a very long time.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is very stable. The reason that we have standardized the usage of CentOS is the stability. It has proven to us to be very stable compared to other options. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I'm running around 1,400 CentOS VMs at the moment.

In terms of scalability, of course, things don't scale always as you want, however, it's a powerful solution.

The Dutch organization where I work has eight people on the payroll, however, we are not the users. We are the people building the backend and we have hundreds of thousands of people using the applications running on the data center. The people that watch OTT or watch television make use of parts of the installation.

How are customer service and technical support?

I'm not on the operational side of the business and therefore have never been in touch with technical support. I cannot speak to how helpful or responsive they are.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We are using Ubuntu, CentOS, and also Red Hat. It really depends on the applications. If we buy applications or we use applications from vendors, if they say it has to run on Red Hat we'll run Red Hat. If they say it better runs on CentOS, it will run on CentOS. We have all the different file systems as we run applications that we buy or rent from vendors that make the applications.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is fairly straightforward. We have been using it for a long time it's an automatic deployment and has templates. People just have to click on the template being installed in the background. It's an automated process in VMware.

The end-user can go to the portal and they can just select which type of machine they want to have and which CentOS release is being deployed. It's a matter of minutes until they can log in.

What about the implementation team?

A company really doesn't need outside assistance. It's fairly automated and simple to manage. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing is very reasonable. From what I understand, we pay a minimal fee, if we pay anything at all.

What other advice do I have?

We use different versions of the solution. It's a mixture depending on the application. Some applications are not upgraded by vendors and therefore we are using old versions. We try to stay with our own applications on the latest and greatest, however, generally, it's a mixture.

I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten.

I'd recommend the solution to other organizations.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Independent Technical Consultant at a transportation company with 1-10 employees
Real User
Top 20
Jun 6, 2021
Low memory consumption, many options for user access customization, and top-notch scalability
Pros and Cons
  • "The user access level is most valuable. When you do administration with CentOS, the number of customizations that you can do for each user is higher than other solutions. It is very customizable."
  • "The YUM install manager can be improved. It is below average as compared to the other install managers. This is the only major problem that I see with CentOS. They should reduce dependency on the YUM manager."

What is our primary use case?

It can be used for setting up virtual spaces and the development environment. We have CentOS VPS.

What is most valuable?

The user access level is most valuable. When you do administration with CentOS, the number of customizations that you can do for each user is higher than other solutions. It is very customizable.

Its memory consumption is much lower than any other OS.

What needs improvement?

The YUM install manager can be improved. It is below average as compared to the other install managers. This is the only major problem that I see with CentOS. They should reduce dependency on the YUM manager.

They can improve the help for features. It has so many features, but there is no help. They should provide more information and tutorials. Currently, because of the lack of knowledge or availability of resources, features are getting underutilized.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using CentOS for around two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is quite stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is one of the top-notch products in terms of scalability. For scalability, many premium features are available.

Currently, we have around 12 to 15 users. We have plans to increase its usage.

How are customer service and technical support?

We don't have much experience with their technical support.

How was the initial setup?

Its installation was quite straightforward. There is not much in terms of the setup cost. It was quite straightforward, and it happened quite quickly. From scratch, it took around one and a half hours.

What about the implementation team?

I installed it myself. For its deployment and maintenance, we don't have any technical team. We are able to manage with less than one person per month. We have a manager who manages it.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

It is open-source, which means it is a free product. It has a one-time deployment cost.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I evaluated Red Hat.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this solution to others. I would rate CentOS a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Fabián Balseca Chávez - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Presales Engineer at a tech company with 51-200 employees
Real User
Top 20
Dec 4, 2022
The open-source community includes valuable collections and collaborations
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution is open source."
  • "The interface could be improved."

What is our primary use case?

Our company has fourteen administrators and developers who use the solution to develop code. 

What is most valuable?

The solution is open source.

The community collections and collaborations are valuable. 

What needs improvement?

The interface could be improved. 

I would like more features for the system manager. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for seven years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is scalable. 

How are customer service and support?

The solution is open source so there is no formal technical support. The community is a great resource and the solution's developers post content or answer questions. 

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We previously used Oracle Linux. 

How was the initial setup?

The setup is easy. 

What about the implementation team?

We implemented the solution in-house.

Four administrators handle ongoing maintenance and management. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The solution is open source so it is free. 

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We switched from Oracle Linux because the solution is free and now private. 

What other advice do I have?

The solution is a good product and I recommend using it. 

I rate the solution a ten out of ten. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Other
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Cuneyt Gurses - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution Architect, DevOps Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Real User
Nov 25, 2022
Provides open architecture but support has ended
Pros and Cons
  • "The open architecture is useful for us. That's why we're using CentOS."
  • "The main issue is the End of Support. For that reason, we will switch to another operating system."

What is our primary use case?

CentOS is an operating system, and our applications are running on EC2 instances.

I am using the latest version, which is version 6.9. 

It's a Linux operating system, but it's compatible with cloud solutions.

This solution is used by over 1,000 clients. We don't plan on increasing usage because Red Hat announced that support has ended for CentOS.

What is most valuable?

 The open architecture is useful for us. That's why we're using CentOS. 

What needs improvement?

The main issue is the End of Support. For that reason, we will switch to another operating system.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have used CentOS for over eight years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It's scalable.

How was the initial setup?

Installation is straightforward. Deployment takes 10 minutes with EC2. In AWS, there is nothing to install because it's ready.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate this solution as five out of ten. 

Because there's an EOS, no one is willing to use CentOS anymore.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
reviewer1934385 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director of Electronic procurement department at a government with 51-200 employees
Real User
Nov 7, 2022
Easy to use, simple implementation, and good support
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature of CentOS is that it is easy to use."
  • "The price of CentOS could improve."

What is our primary use case?

Support of public systems

How has it helped my organization?

We are going with CentOS due to minimalistic and stable approach during OS build preparation.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature of CentOS is that it is easy to use.

What needs improvement?

The price of CentOS could improve.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using CentOS for approximately five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

CentOS is stable.

How are customer service and support?


How was the initial setup?

The setup of CentOS is easy.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

CentOS is an expensive solution. There are other solutions that are rated at the top that are not expensive, such as Red Hat or Oracle Linux.

What other advice do I have?

I rate CentOS an eight out of ten.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free CentOS Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: January 2026
Buyer's Guide
Download our free CentOS Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.