Flatcar Container Linux vs Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) comparison

Kinvolk (acquired by Microsoft) and Red Hat are both solutions in the Operating Systems (OS) for Business category. Kinvolk (acquired by Microsoft) is ranked #21, while Red Hat is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.8. Kinvolk (acquired by Microsoft) holds a 0.7% mindshare in OSB, compared to Red Hat’s 9.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Kinvolk (acquired by Microsoft) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 97% of Red Hat users who would recommend it.

Flatcar Container Linux

Read 1 Flatcar Container Linux review

670 Views
643 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (R...

Read 364 Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) reviews

20,998 Views
20,788 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

Flatcar Container Linux

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (R...

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Flatcar Container Linux and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat, Canonical, Oracle and others in Operating Systems (OS) for Business.

To learn more, read our detailed Operating Systems (OS) for Business Report (Updated: August 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Operating Systems (OS) for Business

August 2025

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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

Flatcar Container Linux

Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business

21st

Average Rating

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (R...

Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business

1st

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

364

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Operating Systems (OS) for Business category, the mindshare of Flatcar Container Linux is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is 9.0%, down from 11.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Operating Systems (OS) for Business Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)	9.0%
Flatcar Container Linux	0.7%
Other	90.3%

Operating Systems (OS) for Business

Featured Reviews

Yogesh Deore

Senior Consultant at Capgemini

The solution is stable and allows us to make needed changes

The development teams could sharpen their skills. They should offer applications on the net I have eight years of experience with Flatcar Container Linux. The version of Flatcar Container Linux that I am using is stable. The scalability of this product is fine. It allows us to make the needed…

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Bruce Lundberg

Linux HPC Systems Administrator at a manufacturing company with 5,001-10,000 employees

Reliable patch management, high uptime, and incredible knowledge base

In terms of security, it does a lot of things that most people still turn off. SELinux is turned on by default. They have pretty good firewall rules in their defaults. The audit rules always take tweaking, but, overall, it comes out of the box not too bad. I used to write scripts to harden them from there. There are multiple ways to provision and patch. You have everything from local repositories to doing it by hand. Their knowledge base is incredible. There is so much information out there. It has never taken me longer than 30 minutes to find an answer to anything, even very tough ones. One company I worked for was a security company, and we did a lot of patching on everything. It was designed around security and email hosting, and uptime was pretty much whatever we wanted it to be. I have had a couple of times when the uptime was bad, but it was caused by a third-party solution. In fact, the Norton antivirus was definitely the worst. Red Hat had nothing to do with it.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Flatcar's support is good. The version I am using is stable and allows us to make needed changes."

"With regard to security, most companies are moving towards the black box approach and Red Hat. It's much more secure compared to the other vendors."

"Insights is nice since I get information on my background and security matters, and it's been helpful to have it there as well."

"Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) helps us solve pain points by allowing us to offer support for our managed services, including very high service-level agreements in terms of availability and everything around CVEs, which is also what most of our customers are interested in."

"I recommend Red Hat Enterprise Linux to others, especially larger companies."

"The knowledge base is excellent."

"RHEL is the most reliable Linux flavor in terms of enterprise governance. I prefer it for its code stability, support, and integration. The lifecycle management features help us maintain compliance and keep the components updated."

"One of the most valuable aspects is the ease of installing packages on the server."

"When we switched from Windows to Linux, we got about an instant 20% increase in performance, which was a very big deal."

More Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) pros

Cons

"The development teams could sharpen their skills. They should offer applications on the net."

"The built-in security features of Red Hat Enterprise Linux were insufficient for our needs, necessitating the implementation of supplementary security measures."

"I recommend that they improve their virtualization product, specifically the management console."

"The adoption was slightly slow because the knowledge in the market is slightly less available. It's hard to find resources to actually support the product."

"The solution's operating system configuration and function selection could be improved."

"Even though I don't have complaints, I would like them to focus even more on what they're doing with Lightspeed and the AI assistance, so they could look more into that."

"AIX will be out of support in the next few years, so that is a problem because a lot of the clinical apps use AIX."

"Nowadays, delays are common with their support, and it often takes time to get assistance from experienced engineers."

"Right now, we need to get memory and CPU via the console."

More Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"The Red Hat Enterprise Linux automation platform subscriptions are quite expensive."

"The licensing is a bit odd because we need to procure the licenses from a third party."

"It is cost-efficient."

"The solution is cost-effective."

"It is more expensive than other vendors in terms of pricing and licensing, but because of its stability, I have to go with it."

"We can always ask for Red Hat Enterprise Linux to be less expensive but when we compare it to other options, there are savings in the long run."

"RHEL has a decent pricing model. It's a subscription, which makes sense. The OS itself is free, but you pay for the support. I have never heard any complaints about the pricing."

"It is very straightforward. We do not have to think much about having to get all the subscriptions related to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux fleet that we have because all the subscriptions came in pairs of CPUs or even for an entire bare-metal server."

More Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user281973

Storage and VMware Expert at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees

Aug 24, 2017

It's improved our company's system environments that run Oracle databases.

Red Hat is mission critical to our environment Red Hat has improved the mission critical environments running Oracle databases, while CentOS has improved our web environment and MySQL. Oracle and SAP Environment and all HPC environments. 10 years No issues Very stable i don´t find any problem…

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

23%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	84
Midsize Enterprise	46
Large Enterprise	248

Questions from the Community

Ask a question

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Which would you choose - RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux) or CentOS?

Red Hat Enterprise Linux is fantastic. It is an inexpensive solution that has excellent security, performance, and stability, and also lots of features. I specifically like that the solution has fe...

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What do you like most about Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)?

It is open source. We can customize it as per our requirements.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)?

My experience with Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) has been largely positive, though there was a significant shift in their pricing structure last year. That change caused considerable discussion a...

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Comparisons

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Compared 45% of the time

Alpine Linux vs Flatcar Container Linux

Compared 20% of the time

CentOS vs Flatcar Container Linux

Compared 9% of the time

Debian vs Flatcar Container Linux

Compared 8% of the time

SUSE Linux Enterprise vs Flatcar Container Linux

Compared 6% of the time

More Flatcar Container Linux Competitors

SUSE Linux Enterprise vs Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)

Compared 19% of the time

Windows Server vs Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)

Compared 15% of the time

Rocky Linux vs Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)

Compared 13% of the time

Oracle Linux vs Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)

Compared 9% of the time

Ubuntu Linux vs Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)

Compared 9% of the time

More Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Operating Systems (OS) for Business

August 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)

August 2025

Download Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) product report

Also Known As

No data available

Red Hat Enterprise Linux, RHEL

Overview

Flatcar Container Linux is a lightweight, secure, and reliable operating system designed for running containers at scale with automatic updates and a minimal attack surface. The solution is easy to use and manage and has a simple and intuitive command-line interface and a powerful set of tools for managing containers and clusters.

It supports various container runtimes, including Docker, Kubernetes, and Mesos. It can be deployed on various infrastructure platforms, including bare metal, virtual machines, and cloud environments. Flatcar Container Linux is an ideal choice for organizations deploying containerized applications in production environments.

Kinvolk (acquired by Microsoft)

Red Hat Enterprise Linux is recognized for its stability, security, and performance, serving diverse industries with its robust support and seamless cloud deployment capabilities.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux provides comprehensive server applications across cloud environments, featuring tools like Ansible for enhanced user experience. It integrates OpenShift, Identity Management, and automation, supported by extensive documentation. Users seek easier upgrades, enhanced network virtualization support, and improved live patching.

What are the key features of Red Hat Enterprise Linux?

Stability and Security: RHEL is designed to provide a stable and secure environment, backed by consistent updates.
Cloud Deployment: Easily deployable across cloud platforms, enhancing flexibility.
Integration with Ansible: Enhances operational efficiency with powerful automation tools.
OpenShift and Containerization: Supports modern app development with integrated OpenShift features.
Extensive Documentation: Offers comprehensive resources for users to troubleshoot and optimize.

What are the benefits of using Red Hat Enterprise Linux?

Reliable Support: Benefit from extensive support options for seamless operation.
Enhanced Security: Built-in features ensure data integrity and protection.
Increased Flexibility: Suitable for diverse deployment environments, including on-premises and cloud.
Operational Efficiency: Tools like automation and cloud navigation improve productivity.
Training and Resources: Access to comprehensive training contributes to smoother implementations.

In sectors like finance, telecommunications, and education, Red Hat Enterprise Linux is crucial for running stable, secure systems. Its application spans web servers, data management, and containerization through tools like Kubernetes. Organizations adopt it for on-premises, virtualized, and cloud environments, ensuring robust infrastructure management.

Red Hat

Sample Customers

CISCO, mettle, Microsoft, Upguard, GMX

Travel Channel, Mohawk Industries, Hilti, Molecular Health, Exolgan, Hotelplan Group, Emory University, BlueCross BlueShield of North Carolina, HCA Healthcare, Paychex, UPS, Intermountain Healthcare, Brinker International, TransUnion, Union Bank, CA Technologies

Buyer's Guide

Operating Systems (OS) for Business

August 2025

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