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AlmaLinux vs Windows Server comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 4, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

AlmaLinux
Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business
17th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
4.3
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Windows Server
Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
195
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

Reliable long-term hosting has reduced server migrations and lets me focus on projects
One area for improvement with AlmaLinux is the use of SELinux to secure and harden my server, which I find to be a complicated beast. Better documentation on that part could be useful, although there is a lot of material out there. I choose a nine because nothing is ever perfect. For example, coming from Ubuntu, I found their firewall software easy to use, while with AlmaLinux's entire ecosystem, I always have to look up how to use firewall-cmd. These are just little preferences. I cannot think of anything else AlmaLinux could improve; it serves me well, and I have not been missing anything.
GS
Manager, Information & Cloud Systems at a consultancy with 1,001-5,000 employees
Long-standing experience improves reliability and security, making it a trusted platform
It's difficult to see improvements when using it daily. They improved compatibility with other platforms, such as Linux. One improvement I was thinking about some years ago was the ability to manage an on-premises server from Azure. Now, they have created Azure Arc, and we are using it as a very good way of managing on-premises servers. What can be improved is on the Azure side. With Active Directory on the server side and Entra ID on the Azure side in our hybrid environment, we find issues with data syncing to Entra ID. In Entra ID, Microsoft omitted some parameters. In Active Directory, you can put an expiring date to an account, but you cannot do that in Entra ID. We have other means of doing that, but it's common to have consultants working for six months, requiring account expiration or renewal processes. The Entra ID Connect syncing tool could be improved. Though they moved the service to Azure and use an agent instead of having a dedicated server, it remains cumbersome to set up due to the differences between Entra ID and Active Directory.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Positively, I can say that AlmaLinux has brought a sense of stability, and besides the security patches, we also noticed better virtualization for our use cases."
"AlmaLinux provides free updates and security, unlike Red Hat, where support must be purchased separately."
"The long-term support provided by AlmaLinux helps my business by ensuring that we do not have to renew our servers every four to five years."
"The most valuable feature I find in AlmaLinux is the binary compatibility with RHEL and the long-term stability, which makes it a predictable, rock-solid system behavior, while also having small and safe packaging for subsystems or systems that run twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week."
"The product can scale."
"I find mutual authentication and the environment useful."
"We have had no problems with Windows Server and we plan to continue using it in the future."
"Nothing is required for the maintenance of the solution, Microsoft does everything. It is very good and robust."
"I like the views in the user interface."
"The solution is stable."
"The most valuable features are the file transfer protocol (FTP) and the secure file transfer protocol (SFTP)."
"The most valuable features I have found to be the flexibility and wide range of support training available."
 

Cons

"If AlmaLinux could provide ten to twenty years of fixes, that would be an improvement because I do not want to update the system all the time, as it becomes more challenging for me as a system administrator to track all the patches and everything I should patch on the system."
"After six months of migration, we ended up using more resources for the same websites, and that's not acceptable."
"One area for improvement with AlmaLinux is the use of SELinux to secure and harden my server, which I find to be a complicated beast."
"The price of Microsoft products has become expensive over the last two years."
"As for additional features, we are very interested in the new feature released by Windows: Azure Virtual Desktop. We are currently exploring it so that instead of people depending on their own desktop, we could work on Azure Virtual Desktop. Integration with Azure Virtual Desktop would be cool."
"Rebooting is sometimes required to resolve issues, although we don't know the root cause."
"The solution is less stable than Linux."
"If Windows could make the OS part lighter, especially starting and restarting the Windows Server, which needs to be quick, then it would be great since this is an area where the tool lacks a bit."
"I would like to see better updates and for it to support other applications"
"The license is a one-time purchase. The cost could be less expensive. We have education pricing, so it's okay now because we pay less than other agencies."
"When it comes to virtualization, VMware is a bit more advanced in terms of security. Hyper-V does provide facilities, but it probably has to do a bit more work in terms of encryption. People will normally go for VMware because of the features that it has as a server, particularly the virtualization feature."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"It could be cheaper."
"Windows Server has medium pricing."
"We are with Microsoft's Cloud Solution Provider Program and we pay for a monthly license for this use of this solution and we support our customer subscriptions. The overall price of the solution is good."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"My company has an enterprise agreement with Microsoft. I feel that the price of the product is okay."
"There is not a license required for this solution."
"We have multiple types of licenses. Some of them are on a yearly basis, and some of them are prepaid."
"The price of the solution could improve."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
14%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
University
8%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business78
Midsize Enterprise41
Large Enterprise88
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AlmaLinux?
AlmaLinux is free of charge, which is why I chose this distribution. It offers an alternative to Red Hat, which is free only without support and updates. AlmaLinux provides free updates and securit...
What needs improvement with AlmaLinux?
It is hard to say what needs improvement because I am on the operations side and focus on installing servers and running our software.
What is your primary use case for AlmaLinux?
I use AlmaLinux as the base operating system for all of our Linux servers. Our environment includes use cases that range from a load balancer on the NGINX platform to our monitoring software, Check...
What needs improvement with Windows Server?
The user interface of Windows Server needs improvement, especially when working with users, user accounts, and groups. There are multiple ways to accomplish tasks that do not align completely, so t...
What is your primary use case for Windows Server?
I integrated Windows Server in my infrastructure. We use Hyper-V technology extensively, as it is very important for us, and it functions quite well.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

AlmaLinux OS 8 (x86_64), AlmaLinux OS 10 (x86_64)
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Rakuten, Rackspace, Tyco
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