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Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) vs Rocky Linux comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 20, 2025

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

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (R...
Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
321
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Rocky Linux
Ranking in Operating Systems (OS) for Business
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Operating Systems (OS) for Business category, the mindshare of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is 9.3%, down from 12.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Rocky Linux is 15.7%, up from 9.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Operating Systems (OS) for Business
 

Featured Reviews

Bruce Lundberg - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Jetsada Malaisirirat - PeerSpot reviewer
Enhancements in package management elevate user experience
I have been using Rocky Linux for three or four years. It is used for HPC, online assessments, and Ceph storage The solution is free and open source. The OS choice in my project is quite specific. It is based on customer requirements, as they might want to use Rocky Linux or Ubuntu, depending on…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features of RHEL are the availability, file system performance, and overall system availability."
"The simplicity of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) benefits my company in general since we're under many audits and regulations that allow us to track any discrepancies we may find in the reports, as to remediate those vulnerabilities and apply the necessary patches so that we can be compliant with our systems."
"Open architecture allows for accelerated growth while secure repositories guarantee stability."
"I would rate the customer service and technical support of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) at a ten out of ten."
"Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) definitely helps to mitigate downtime; we reboot our servers twice a year and do our patches, and that helps reduce our risk of exposure to malware, worms, viruses, but also increases our uptime."
"It's been great since we have it. It's been reliable and fast."
"The stability and reliability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) are very good."
"The only reason our clients use Red Hat Enterprise Linux is because Red Hat offers commercial support."
"The custom install scripts streamline the setup process, making it straightforward."
"The solution is free and open source."
"It's very simple to work with, easy to learn, and know where things are."
"I haven't needed to use customer service or support, which speaks volumes about their product's reliability and ease of use."
"It helps us keep our workstations in sync and ensures consistent settings across most of our machines."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its stability."
 

Cons

"My number one request for improvement would be better Kickstart functionality, as I feel the Kickstart notation is outdated and it's not programmatic, so that would be my focus point, based on what I do."
"That said, there are others that are not just generally support specific to Red Hat, which is a problem."
"We have experienced some issues with the support."
"I have seen that the upgrade from RHEL 7 to RHEL 8 can be a bit problematic since I have seen some issues during the upgrade of libraries, along with some conflicts with the other libraries in the tool."
"I would like to see a better way to organize the jobs within Ansible, specifically with the automation platform."
"The solution should provide better documentation."
"Regarding areas for improvement, I can suggest streamlining SELinux, which currently feels heavy-handed in its approach to security. It's a system that requires deep immersion to understand. While there's probably justification for its current implementation, making the security component less intimidating for users would be beneficial."
"Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is already good and perfect. They can continue to improve the AI features."
"Improved integration with Windows, particularly Active Directory, would be beneficial for the product. Currently, this aspect requires additional effort."
"The package versions can be quite older compared to other distributions such as Ubuntu."
"The solution's audio integration for virtual machines could be improved."
"I have certain problems with the tool's DNS part, making it an area where improvements are required."
"One of the potential issues is that if you don't pay for support, you may need to manage certain aspects on your own and rely on the community for assistance."
"In terms of improvement, Rocky Linux needs to clarify its identity and target audience."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"RHEL's price seems to be consistently changing, depending on what you're after. We might need a more extended license to lock in a price if it keeps changing. It would be nicer if it stayed steady within a specific range, but it's negotiable. We try to negotiate, and maybe a more extended contract would be better."
"I'm unsure what the standard RHEL license costs for one machine. We pay for premium support that guarantees a response in two hours."
"Our client has a direct subscription to Red Hat."
"The licensing makes perfect sense for the amount of stuff you get with the operating system."
"The solution is moving away from its open source roots and licensing is a little bit of an issue."
"For the basic operating system, its price is fair. It is not cheap, and it is also not expensive. For the OpenShift or OpenStack implementation, the cost is a little higher than what I would expect, but it is doable. For a storage solution, it is almost impossible to pay. In comparison to open-source competitors, RHEL has the most cost-effective open-source subscription model."
"The cost is based on each organization's budget and infrastructure."
"We charge €2,000 per system for three years."
"Compared to the market prices of other tools, the solution has a very competitive pricing."
"The product is expensive. I rate the pricing a three."
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Comparison Review

it_user281973 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
14%
University
11%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Educational Organization
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What do you like most about Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)?
It is open source. We can customize it as per our requirements.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)?
Pricing is sometimes an issue for our clients because it's not a cheap solution. The different licenses have a high cost, and perhaps they could improve by offering different kinds of discounts or ...
What do you like most about Rocky Linux?
It's very simple to work with, easy to learn, and know where things are.
What needs improvement with Rocky Linux?
The OS choice in my project is quite specific. It is based on customer requirements, as they might want to use Rocky Linux or Ubuntu, depending on their needs. The package versions can be quite old...
What is your primary use case for Rocky Linux?
I have been using Rocky Linux for three or four years. It is used for HPC, online assessments, and Ceph storage.
 

Also Known As

Red Hat Enterprise Linux, RHEL
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) vs. Rocky Linux and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.