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Amazon Linux vs openSUSE Leap comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Amazon Linux
Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business
16th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
openSUSE Leap
Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business
11th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Operating Systems (OS) for Business category, the mindshare of Amazon Linux is 0.5%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of openSUSE Leap is 6.0%, up from 5.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Operating Systems (OS) for Business Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
openSUSE Leap6.0%
Amazon Linux0.5%
Other93.5%
Operating Systems (OS) for Business
 

Featured Reviews

SAURAB K GANGURDE - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior AWS Consultant at Quantum Integrators
“Amazon Linux delivers automated security updates— including live kernel patching in AL2023—ensuring protected workloads with minimal manual effort and zero-downtime patching.”
One improvement for Amazon Linux would be stronger support for running it outside AWS. Although Amazon provides local VM images for VirtualBox and VMware, they are intended mainly for development and testing. Unlike Ubuntu, Debian, or Red Hat, Amazon Linux is not designed or fully supported as a production OS in on-prem or hybrid environments. Expanding official support outside AWS would offer more flexibility for teams that maintain mixed infrastructure. Another area for improvement is the community ecosystem. Compared to Ubuntu or Red Hat, Amazon Linux has a smaller community and fewer third-party resources or tutorials. A larger ecosystem would make troubleshooting and adoption easier. Finally, improving backward compatibility between Amazon Linux 2 and Amazon Linux 2023—especially around package management (DNF vs yum) and updated toolchains—would simplify upgrades for teams managing large fleets.
NK
Senior Manager at Cognizant
Provides BTRFS file system, which allows you to take snapshots
I only use the tool for testing purposes on my team, but multiple people use it. We don't make a team effort to install the solution. When it comes to maintenance, we ask our company to buy SUSE Linux Enterprise. My team consists of 13 people. We are currently integrating the solution with Ansible to do some coding. Although not a full-fledged automation, we are integrating the solution with Ansible and executing a couple of playbooks connected to openSUSE Leap. I would recommend the solution to other users looking for an open-source solution. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One great feature is the ability to apply critical security patches without rebooting the server, which avoids downtime and is why we prefer to use Amazon Linux for production servers and low-latency applications."
"Amazon Linux has positively impacted our organization in a couple of ways."
"I find Amazon Linux valuable for its direct functionality; the best features include the core capabilities that make it suitable for our operations."
"The product itself is very good; even if I switch organizations and they are not using Amazon Linux, I will share my experience that Amazon Linux has worked great for us in these use cases."
"From my personal and system perspective, I have experienced over the last one year that any packages run easily in Amazon Linux, which I would recommend because I am a cloud engineer for AWS cloud for the last six plus years and I am aware of how these things are involved."
"The positive impact of Amazon Linux on my organization is significant, as it has improved organizational security by closing known vulnerabilities quickly, reducing the risk of hacking and malware, resulting in fewer security incidents and lower breach risk."
"Amazon Linux has positively impacted my organization by increasing productivity since automation is easy and fast, allowing me to set up servers easily, thus productivity increases and efficiency improves as soon as possible while deploying my application using Amazon Linux."
"With respect to scalability, security, and reliability, these services help me significantly."
"Stable - it just runs without the necessity to reboot."
"The solution's most valuable feature is the BTRFS file system, which allows you to take snapshots."
"openSUSE Leap has helped me with using containers in Podman."
"The most valuable feature by far has been the virtualization capabilities of the operating system."
"The solution is very stable after it is configured. It is hard to have a panel slow, a problem, misconfiguration, or any kind of loss function."
"The solution is easy for me to use because the backend is derived from FreeBSD and this is something I have been using for over 20 years."
 

Cons

"Compared to Ubuntu and other Linux distributions, Amazon Linux has worse support, which often leads us to rely heavily on documentation."
"Amazon Linux could be improved by including libraries for supervisor."
"I choose nine out of ten because it could use a bit more options."
"While Amazon Linux worked very well overall for us, there could be a few areas for improvement."
"Amazon last provided some security patches that were not very fast, which was one reason I did not rate it higher, along with a few things, such as some particular versions of Python that are not readily available in Amazon Linux."
"For the improvement of Amazon Linux, I think there should be UI features in the future, as Amazon Linux currently has only terminal capabilities without a UI, and I hope to see documentation updates as soon as possible so when documentation expires, I am updating it and referring to it soon."
"Amazon Linux can be improved by having the documentation contain more examples of use cases."
"Amazon Linux could be improved by including additional features and continuous improvements in various areas."
"There is room for improvement in the console."
"I would like openSUSE Leap to have better link integration with Windows."
"In the future, the Active Directory could improve."
"It would be helpful if we could easily switch from openSUSE Leap for testing to SUSE Linux Enterprise for production."
"Somehow the change from OS12.x via 13.x to Leap was a bit bumpy and some old issues seemed to reappear."
"Like most Linux-based operating systems, the biggest challenge Leap faces is the GUI."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The cost of this solution was reasonable and it was within our budget."
"This is an open-source operating system that can be used free of charge."
"openSUSE Leap is an open-source solution that is free of cost."
"The solution is open-source."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
15%
Government
11%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
20%
Educational Organization
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Amazon Linux?
Right now, I don't think there are any specific areas to improve in Amazon Linux.
What is your primary use case for Amazon Linux?
The use cases for this in our company is that we have a customer that internally uses it for several applications, and they are a telecommunications company that has virtual machines and Linux mach...
What advice do you have for others considering Amazon Linux?
I use AWS, Azure, and I'm starting to use GCP, Google Cloud Platform. I have also used ZoomInfo. I have been using the product since its creation. I have not used the ZoomInfo product. With Amazon,...
What needs improvement with openSUSE Leap?
Both openSUSE Leap and the SUSE Enterprise version use the same kernel. Suppose I have a lower environment where I can run openSUSE to test all my products. It would be helpful if I could easily sw...
What is your primary use case for openSUSE Leap?
I use openSUSE Leap for testing purposes. Before officially using any server in our office, we test it using the solution. My office usually uses production servers on the SUSE Linux enterprise ver...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for openSUSE Leap?
openSUSE Leap is an open-source solution that is free of cost.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon Linux vs. openSUSE Leap and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.