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Rocky Linux 9.4 was officially released to the general public on 9 May 2024. This version is available for the x86_64, aarch64, ppc64le and s390x architectures and uses the 5.14.0-427.13.1 kernel. Information on known issues and comprehensive changes can be found in the release notes of the Rocky Linux documentation.
Key information
Major new features and changes
- Since Rocky Linux 9.3, Azure images have been appearing under a new publisher name: resf, moving away from the previous, less intuitive name.
- As well as being available on the Azure Marketplace, Rocky Linux is available free of charge in the Azure Community Gallery, which makes it incredibly easy to run Rocky on Microsoft Azure. This news item is about how to use the images in the Community Gallery.
- AWS images will now also be launched exclusively on IPv6 subnets, and the majority of images are already being created using the KIWI tool.
Software versions
| Area | Versions |
|---|---|
| Languages | Python 3.12, Ruby 3.3, PHP 8.2 |
| Web server | nginx 1.24 |
| Databases | MariaDB 10.11, PostgreSQL 16 |
| Version control | Git 2.43.0, Git LFS 3.4.1 |
| Compilers and toolkits | GCC Toolset 13, LLVM Toolset 17.0, Rust Toolset 1.75.0, Go Toolset 1.21.0 |
Here’s how to enable PHP 8.2:
dnf module reset php
dnf module install php:8.2
Security
Below are the key security highlights of the latest release of Rocky Linux 9.4. The full list of security-related changes can be found in the RHEL 9.4 release notes.
- Version 3.6 of SELinux userspace introduces ‘deny’ rules to allow for further customisation of policies.
- Keylime’s server components – the verifier and the registrar – are available as containers.
- The Rsyslog processing system introduces customisable TLS/SSL encryption settings and additional options relating to the discarding of capabilities.
- The OpenSSL TLS toolkit provides a fallback directory for provider-specific configuration files.
- libkcapi 1.4.0 introduces new tools and options. With the new
-Toption, you can specify the names of target files in hash calculations. - The stunnel 5.7.1 TLS/SSL tunnelling service changes the behaviour of OpenSSL 1.1 and later versions in FIPS mode. In addition to this change, this version provides a number of new features, such as support for modern PostgreSQL clients.
Containers
The main changes are as follows:
- The
podman build farmcommand is available as a technology preview for creating multi-architecture container images. - Podman now supports containers.conf modules for loading predefined configurations.
- The Container Tools package has been updated
- The Podman v4.9 RESTful API now displays progress data when you drag or drop an image into the registry
- SQLite is now fully supported as the default database backend for Podman
- Containerfile now supports multi-line HereDoc directives
- ‘pasta’ is now obsolete as a network name
- The BoltDB database backend is now obsolete
- The container-tools:4.0 module is now obsolete.
- The Container Network Interface (CNI) network stack is deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
Outdated software
Some application packages included in the Rocky Linux 9.4 repositories will no longer receive updates. These currently include Node.js 16 (end-of-life in April 2024) and .NET 7 (end-of-life in May 2024). Furthermore, OpenJDK 11 will reach end-of-life (EoL) for Rocky Linux 9 in October 2024. Please ensure you use the supported versions (Node.js 18 or 20 modules, .NET 6 or 8 packages, OpenJDK 1.8.0, 17 or 21 packages) if you wish to receive further updates.
You can find a detailed list of updates and changes in the Rocky Linux 9.4 release notes.
Testing
Every single Rocky Linux release undergoes thorough testing for accuracy and stability, which includes both manual and automated checks carried out in various environments and configurations.
Rocky Linux 9.4 underwent rigorous testing for a week before receiving final approval. The test results, discussions and release checklist are available on the ‘rocky-release-v94’ channel at chat.rockylinux.org.
Anyone interested in the release process can join the team at chat.rockylinux.org.
ISO verification
Once you have downloaded the 9.4 installation ISOs (Rocky-9.4-x86_64-boot.iso, -minimal.iso, -dvd1.iso/-dvd.iso), it is worth checking them. In the folder where you saved the ISOs:
curl -O https://dl.rockylinux.org/vault/rocky/9.4/isos/x86_64/CHECKSUM
sha256sum -c CHECKSUM --ignore-missing
The command compares the ISO files in the folder with the CHECKSUM file and returns an ‘OK’ result next to the downloaded image file. The packages are signed by the Rocky Linux 9 GPG key (RPM-GPG-KEY-Rocky-9, fingerprint: 21CB 256A E16F C54C 6E65 2949 702D 426D 350D 275D), which dnf automatically verifies after installation.
Update and migration
An existing Rocky Linux 9 system can be updated using the usual command:
sudo dnf -y upgrade
Rocky Linux only ever supports the latest point release of each major release, so the command now updates to the latest release in the 9 series. You can migrate from other Enterprise Linux 9 distributions (AlmaLinux, CentOS, Oracle Linux, RHEL) using the migrate2rocky script.
Rocky Linux does not officially support in-place upgrades between major versions; it recommends a fresh installation from version 8 to 9. If you do wish to perform an in-place upgrade, you can find the steps for the community-developed ELevate tool in our ELevate guide.
How long is it supported for?
Active support for Rocky Linux 9 (“Blue Onyx”) runs until 31 May 2027, and its lifecycle ends on 31 May 2032. Only the latest minor version receives updates. Further releases in the 9 series:
- Rocky Linux 9.0 (July 2022)
- Rocky Linux 9.1 (November 2022)
- Rocky Linux 9.2 (May 2023)
- Rocky Linux 9.3 (November 2023)
- Rocky Linux 9.5 (November 2024)
- Rocky Linux 9.6 (June 2025)
- Rocky Linux 9.7 (December 2025)
- Rocky Linux 9.8 (May 2026)
You can also choose Rocky Linux 9 as your operating system when ordering a KVM VPS or dedicated server.