# Comparison of operating system kernels

A kernel is a component of a computer operating system. A comparison of system kernels can provide insight into the design and architectural choices made by the developers of particular operating systems.

## Comparison criteria

The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of widely used and currently available operating system kernels. Please see the individual products' articles for further information.
Even though there are a large number and variety of available Linux distributions, all of these kernels are grouped under a single entry in these tables, due to the differences among them being of the patch level. See comparison of Linux distributions for a detailed comparison. Linux distributions that have highly modified kernels — for example, real-time computing kernels — should be listed separately. There are also a wide variety of minor BSD operating systems, many of which can be found at comparison of BSD operating systems.
The tables specifically do not include subjective viewpoints on the merits of each kernel or operating system.

## Feature overview

The major contemporary general-purpose kernels are shown in comparison. Only an overview of the technical features is detailed.
| Kernel name | Programming language | Used in | Creator | Executable format (also see section below) | Type | Integrated firewall | SMP support | Multiple architecture support (also see section below). | Multitasking | Virtualization | Security | Profiling/Debugging | Soft real-time support | Hard real-time support | Can keep RTC in UT |
| Amiga Exec | | AmigaOS | Commodore International | HUNK | Exokernel (atypical) | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | No | No |
| Amiga Exec SG (2nd Generation) | | AmigaOS 4 | Hyperion Entertainment | ELF/HUNK | Exokernel (atypical) | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | No | ? |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | C | DragonFly BSD | Matt Dillon | ELF | hybrid | Ipfirewall, PF | Yes | No | Yes | chroot, jail, vkernel | Unix permissions | DDB, KGDB | ? | ? | ? |
| FreeBSD kernel | C | FreeBSD, Debian GNU/kFreeBSD, Gentoo/FreeBSD, Orbis OS | The FreeBSD Project | ELF, others - platform dependent | monolithic | IPFilter, Ipfirewall, PF | Yes | Yes | Yes | chroot, jail, bhyve | Unix permissions, POSIX.1e and NFSv4 ACLs, Capsicum, TrustedBSD MAC, OpenBSM | KDB, DDB, KGDB, DTrace, hwpmc | Yes | ? | Yes |
| GNU Hurd | C | GNU/Hurd (Arch Hurd, Debian GNU/Hurd) | GNU Project/Free Software Foundation | ELF | multiserver microkernel | No | Partial | No | Yes | chroot, Xen | Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, POSIX Capabilities | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| GNU Mach | C | part of GNU Hurd, used in GNU/Hurd | GNU Project/Free Software Foundation | ELF | microkernel | No | Partial | No | Yes | chroot, Xen | Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, POSIX Capabilities | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Inferno kernel | | Inferno | Bell Labs / Vita Nuova Holdings | ? | virtual machine | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | chroot, Xen | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| L4 | | L4 | Jochen Liedtke | No | microkernel | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Afterburner/L4 , Marzipan , capabilities in L4/Fiasco | L4/Fiasco | L4/Fiasco | ? | ? |
| Linux kernel | C | Linux (kernel), Android, Ubuntu, CentOS, webOS, Fire OS, Firefox OS, ChromeOS, Syllable Server, Mastodon Linux, OpenBSD/Linux, Plan 9/Linux, Sailfish OS, Tizen, amongst others. | Linus Torvalds | ELF, others | monolithic | Ipfirewall (1.1 –) ipchains (2.2 –) Netfilter (2.4 – 3.x) nftables (3.13 –) XDP (4.8 –) | Yes | Yes | Yes | cgroups, chroot, Lguest, Xen, KVM, kvm-lite, LXC | Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, POSIX Capabilities, keyctl, LSM (SELinux, SMACK, TOMOYO Linux, AppArmor) | OProfile, kprobe, SystemTap, JProbe, ftrace, KDB, KGDB, kernel marker, perf tools, eBPF | preempt=full, threadirqs | PREEMPT RT | Yes |
| Compute Node Linux | | Compute Node Linux | Cray Inc. | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Mach | C | NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP for Mach, Tru64 UNIX and MkLinux | Carnegie Mellon University | Mach-O | microkernel, hybrid kernel | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| MINIX 3 kernel | C | MINIX 3 | Andrew S. Tanenbaum | ELF, a.out | microkernel | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | Unix permissions | Call profiling, statistical profiling, Minix Debugger (mdb) | No | No | ? |
| NetBSD kernel | C | NetBSD, GNU/kNetBSD (Debian GNU/NetBSD), | The NetBSD Project | ELF, others - platform dependent | monolithic, anykernel using rump kernel architecture | IPFilter, PF, NPF | Yes | Yes | Yes | Xen, chroot | kauth, Unix permissions | DDB, KGDB, tprof | POSIX real-time scheduling extensions | Kernel preemption | Yes |
| NetWare kernel | | NetWare | Novell | NLM | hybrid | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenBSD kernel | C | OpenBSD | OpenBSD developers | ELF, others - platform dependent | monolithic | PF | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Unix permissions | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OS/2 kernel | | OS/2 version 2 and above | IBM | LX | hybrid | No | Yes | No PowerPC version developed but never officially released. | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | ? |
| Plan 9 kernel | C | Plan 9 from Bell Labs | Bell Labs | ? | monolithic | ipmux | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| ReactOS kernel | C | ReactOS | ReactOS Foundation | PE | hybrid | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? |
| Rockbox kernel | | Rockbox | The Rockbox Project | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| SunOS kernel | C | SunOS | Sun Microsystems | a.out | monolithic | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Unix permissions | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris kernel | C | Solaris, OpenSolaris, GNU/kOpenSolaris (Nexenta OS) | Sun Microsystems | ELF (32-bit only until Solaris 7 in 1998) | monolithic | IPFilter, PF (since Oracle Solaris 11.3) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Zones, chroot | Unix permissions, ACL, RBAC, Auditing, Privileges, Zones, Trusted Extensions | DTrace, CPU profiling, microstate accounting, perf counters, kernel lock stats, kstats, mdb, kmdb | Real-time scheduler | ? | ? |
| Trix kernel | | Trix | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | a.out | monolithic | ? | Yes | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | C | All Windows NT family systems, 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, Windows Phone 8.1, Windows 10, Windows 11, Windows Server | Microsoft | PE | hybrid | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Hyper-V | ACL | Event Tracing, dgbss, kd | Multimedia Class Scheduler Service | No | Unofficial |
| Windows 9x kernel | C++ | Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me | Microsoft | PE | monolithic | | | | | | | | | | |
| XNU (Darwin kernel) | C, C++ | macOS, iOS, iPadOS, tvOS, watchOS, OpenDarwin, PureDarwin GNU/Darwin | Apple Inc. | Mach-O | hybrid | Ipfirewall, PF (starting in Lion) | Yes | Yes | Yes | chroot | Unix permissions, NT/NFSv4 ACLs, TrustedBSD MAC, OpenBSM | KDB, DDB, DTrace | Yes | No | Yes |
| SPARTAN kernel | C | HelenOS | Jakub Jermar | ELF | microkernel | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Zircon | C++ | Fuchsia OS | Google | ELF | microkernel | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Lguest, Xen, KVM, kvm-lite | Yes | KDB, DDB, GDB | Yes | No | Yes |

## Failure analysis and Availability

| Kernel Name | Kernel Log | Serious system error report | Fatal system error report | Kernel crash dump | Kernel debugger | Hardware error detection | Software RAID | Remote storage replication | CPU hotplug | Memory hotplug | Kernel live patching |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | Yes | ? | Kernel panic | ? | ddb | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| FreeBSD kernel | kern.msgbuf in sysctl | ? | Kernel panic | Yes | KGDB | ? | GEOM | (HAST in user-space) | ? | ? | ? |
| Linux kernel | kmsg | Linux kernel oops | Kernel panic / drm_panic | kdump | KDB / KGDB | EDAC (formerly Bluesmoke) | md | DRBD | Yes | Yes | kpatch |
| NetBSD kernel | Yes | ? | Kernel panic | ? | DDB / KGDB | ? | RAIDframe | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenBSD kernel | Yes | ? | Kernel panic | Yes | ddb | ? | softraid | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | System core dump | mdb | ereport | Solaris Volume Manager | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | NT Kernel Logger in ETW | NT Kernel Logger in ETW | Blue screen of death (BSoD) | Kernel-mode Dump | KD | WHEA | Storage Spaces / Disk Management | Storage Replica / DFS Replication | ? | ? | Hotpatch |
| XNU | Yes | ? | Kernel panic | ? | ddb / kdp | ? | AppleRAID | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Zircon | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |

## Scalability and Clustering

| Kernel Name | Supported number of CPU cores | NUMA support | Computer cluster interconnect | Computer cluster interconnect | Computer cluster interconnect | Computer cluster interconnect | Application checkpointing / Process migration | Single system image | Clustered file system |
| Kernel Name | Supported number of CPU cores | NUMA support | Remote direct memory access (RDMA) support | InfiniBand support | PCI Express Non-Transparent Bridge (NTB) support | CXL 3.1 inter-host communication support | Application checkpointing / Process migration | Single system image | Clustered file system |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | 256 | Partial | ? | ? | ? | ? | sys_checkpoint | planned | HAMMER2 |
| FreeBSD kernel | 1024 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | No | ? |
| Linux kernel | 8192 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Checkpoint/Restart | (openMosix) | Ceph / OCFS2 / GFS2 |
| Windows NT kernel | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | Cluster Shared Volumes |

## Realtime support

| Kernel Name | Full kernel preemption | Realtime Scheduling | Realtime Priority | Realtime I/O | Preemptable locks | Prevent priority inversion (Priority inheritance) | CPU Isolation | Disable CPU's Interrupt request (IRQ) handling | Disable CPU's timer ticks | Prevent memory from being swapped out |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | mlock/mlockall system call |
| FreeBSD kernel | ? | ULE scheduler's SCHED_FIFO/SCHED_RR | rtprio system call | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | mlock/mlockall system call |
| Linux kernel | preempt=full | CFS/EEVDF's SCHED FIFO/SCHED RR | rtprio system call | IOPRIO_CLASS_RT | rtmutex on PREEMPT RT | rtmutex on PREEMPT RT | isolcpus | irqaffinity | nohz_full | mlock/mlockall system call |
| NetBSD kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | mlock/mlockall system call |
| OpenBSD kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | mlock/mlockall system call |
| Solaris kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | mlock/mlockall system call |
| Windows NT kernel | ? | REALTIME_PRIORITY_CLASS | ? | ? | ? | AutoBoost | ? | ? | ? | VirtualLock |
| XNU | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | mlock system call |
| Zircon | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |

## Transport protocol support

| Kernel Name | Protocols | Protocols | Protocols | Protocols | Protocols | Protocols | L4S Congestion controls | L4S Congestion controls | L4S Congestion controls |
| Kernel Name | TCP | Multipath TCP | UDP | SCTP | DCCP | QUIC | Accurate ECN | TCP Prague | Dual-Queue Coupled Active Queue Management |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| FreeBSD kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Optional | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Linux kernel | Yes | Partial | Yes | Yes | Yes | (QUIC in Linux Kernel) | (Linux kernel tree with L4S patches) | (Linux kernel tree with L4S patches) | (Linux kernel tree with L4S patches) |
| NetBSD kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenBSD kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| XNU | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Zircon | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |

## In-kernel security

| Kernel | File access control | Disable memory execution support | Kernel ASLR | Mandatory access control | Capability-based security | In-kernel key management | Audit API | Sandbox | SYN flood protection | UDP flood protection | Ping flood protection | Smurf attack protection | Network Behavior Analysis |
| Linux | Traditional Unix permissions, POSIX ACL | Yes | Yes | LSM (SELinux, SMACK, TOMOYO Linux, AppArmor) | seccomp | keyctl | fanotify | SELinux Sandbox, seccomp | SYN cookies | hash tables | ICMP rate limiting | reverse path filtering | Netfilter |
| FreeBSD | Traditional Unix permissions, POSIX and NFSv4 ACL | Yes | Yes | TrustedBSD MAC | Capsicum | ? | OpenBSM | Capsicum, MAC framework | SYN cookies | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris | Traditional Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, NFSv4 ACL | Default | ? | Solaris Trusted Extensions | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT | Access control list | DEP | Yes | Mandatory Integrity Control | AppContainers | No | Yes | Windows Event Log | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? |
| XNU | Traditional Unix permissions, NT/NFSv4 ACL | Yes | Yes | TrustedBSD MAC | ? | ? | OpenBSM | Apple XNU Sandbox | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |

## In-kernel virtualization

| Kernel Name | Container (no resource management, no security) | Container (no resource management) | Container (resource management) | Paravirtualization | Full virtualization | User-space execution | Kernel as Library | Kernel as Kernel Driver | Hypervisor-Enforced Kernel Partitioning |
| Linux | chroot | LXC | LXC | Virtio, Hyper-V (guest only), Xen (guest only), VMI (guest only), kvm-lite, lguest | KVM | UML | (LKL) | (coLinux) | No |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | chroot | jail | jail | No | No | vkernel | ? | ? | No |
| FreeBSD kernel | chroot | jail | jail | Virtio, Xen (guest only) | BHyVe (KVM) | ? | ? | ? | No |
| NetBSD kernel | chroot | (sysjail (discontinued)) | No | Virtio and Xen | No | ? | Rump kernel | ? | No |
| Solaris kernel | chroot | Solaris Containers / Zones | Solaris Containers / Zones | No | No | No | ? | ? | No |
| Windows NT kernel | AppContainers, Job Objects, Windows Server Containers | AppContainers, Job Objects, Windows Server Containers | AppContainers, Job Objects, Windows Server Containers | Hyper-V | Hyper-V | Project Drawbridge | Project Drawbridge | No | Virtual Secure Mode, Device Guard, Credential Guard |
| XNU | chroot | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No |

## In-kernel server support

| Kernel Name | HTTP | FTP | NFS | CIFS | Name server | Transport-layer load balancer | Application-layer load balancer | 9P | TLS proxy | WAF | Memcached server |
| Linux kernel | (TUX web server patch) | (TUX web server patch) | knfsd | ksmbd | ? | IP Virtual Server | (KTCPVS) | (patch available) | SOL_TLS | (Tempesta FW) | (kmemcached) |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | No | No | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | No | No | ? | ? |
| FreeBSD kernel | No | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | ? | ? |
| Solaris kernel | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | KSSL | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | HTTP.sys | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | No | ? | ? | ? |
| XNU | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | ? |

## Binary format support

A comparison of OS support for different binary formats (executables):
| Name | a.out | ECOFF | ELF | FDPIC ELF binaries (mmu less) | flat binaries (superH) | HUNK | Mach-O | Misc (wrapper based, like interpreters) | PE | SOM (PA-RISC, HP-UX) | NLM | PEF | DOS COM | MZ | LE | LX | NE |
| Amiga Exec | No | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| DragonFly BSD | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| FreeBSD | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| HP-UX | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Linux | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | Some | Yes | ? | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| MINIX 3 | Some | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| NetBSD | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenBSD | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| ReactOS | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | Some | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT | No | No | Yes with WSL | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes on x86 | Yes on x86 | ? | ? | Yes on x86 |
| XNU | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |

## File system support

Physical file systems:
| Kernel | Acorn ADFS | Amiga FFS | APFS | BeFS | BFS | cramfs | EFS | ext2 | ext3 | ext4 | F2FS | FAT | FreeVxFS | HFS | HFS+ | HPFS | ISO 9660 | JFFS | JFFS2 | JFS | MINIX fs | NSS | NTFS | OCFS | QNX4 FS | System V FS | UDF | UFS | XFS | ZFS | ReiserFS | Reiser4 | Btrfs | HAMMER | Tux3 | exFAT | ReFS |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | limited write | No | No | No | read only | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No |
| FreeBSD kernel | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | limited write | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | read only | Yes | read only | No | No | No | No | ? | No |
| Linux kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | read only | Yes | Yes | read only | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | read only | Yes | limited write (only with empty journal) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes (Full R/W with additional userspace driver) | Yes | Yes | write support? | Yes | Yes | Yes | both FUSE and native | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| MINIX 3 kernel | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | Tools available, cannot mount | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| NetBSD kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| NetWare kernel | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | No |
| OpenBSD kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| ReactOS kernel | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | Read only | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| Solaris kernel | ? | ? | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | ? | No |
| Windows NT kernel | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| XNU | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | Read-Only | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | read only | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No |

## Networked file system support

| Kernel Name | NFS | AFS | CIFS | Coda | 9P | Ceph |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | up to NFSv3 | No | Yes | No | No | No |
| FreeBSD kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Linux kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| NetBSD kernel | up to NFSv3 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenBSD kernel | up to NFSv3 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
| Windows NT kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
| XNU | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |

## Supported CPU instruction sets and microarchitectures

| kernel | HP | HP | HP | Softbank, ARM Holdings | Softbank, ARM Holdings | Intel | Intel | Intel | Intel | MIPS | MIPS | IBM | IBM | IBM | IBM | Renesas Electronics | Renesas Electronics | Renesas Electronics | Renesas Electronics | Renesas Electronics | Renesas Electronics | Renesas Electronics | Oracle | Oracle | Oracle | NXP | NXP | Analog Devices | Xilinx | Cadence | Cadence | Canon, Axis Comm. | Socionext | Socionext | Microchip, Atmel | CML, Hyperstone | Intel, Altera | Intel, Altera | Intel, Altera | WDC | Sunplus Technology | NVIDIA | TI |
| kernel | VAX | Alpha | PA-RISC | ARM | ARM | x86 | x86 | i960 | IA-64 | MIPS | MIPS | PowerPC | PowerPC | S/390 | z/Arch | H8300 | M16C | M32R | 78K | V850 | SuperH | SuperH | SPARC | SPARC | SPARC | m68k | m68k | Blackfin (no-mmu) | MicroBlaze | Xtensa | Xtensa | ETRAX CRIS | FR-V | MN10300 | AVR32 | E1 (no-mmu) | Nios (no-mmu) | Nios II | Nios II | WDC 65C816 | S+core | Tilera | C6X |
| kernel | VAX | Alpha | PA-RISC | mmu | no-mmu | x86 | x86-64 | i960 | IA-64 | mmu | no-mmu | 32-bit | 64-bit | S/390 | z/Arch | H8300 | M16C | M32R | 78K | V850 | mmu | no-mmu | 32-bit | 64-bit | no-mmu | mmu | no-mmu | Blackfin (no-mmu) | MicroBlaze | mmu | no-mmu | ETRAX CRIS | FR-V | MN10300 | AVR32 | E1 (no-mmu) | Nios (no-mmu) | mmu | no-mmu | WDC 65C816 | S+core | Tilera | C6X |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| FreeBSD kernel | No | 6.4 and below only | No | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | No | 10.4 and below only | projected to end in 14.x | No | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | 12.x and below only | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| Linux kernel | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | 4.16 and below only | No | 2.6 and below only | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | 4.16 and below only | Yes | Yes | Yes | 4.16 and below only | 4.16 and below only | 4.16 and below only | 4.12 and below only | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | 4.16 and below only | 4.16 and below only | Yes |
| MINIX 3 kernel | ? | No | No | Yes | ? | Yes | In progress | No | No | In progress | ? | No | No | No | No | No | ? | No | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| NetBSD kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| NetWare kernel | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenBSD kernel | last supported release 5.8 | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | No | Yes | ? | Yes | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Rockbox kernel | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Solaris kernel | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | Yes | Yes | ? | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | No | NT 5.0 RC1 and below only | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No | XP and 2003-2008 R2 only | NT 4.0 and below only | No | NT 3.51 and NT 4.0 only | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| Windows CE kernel | No | No | No | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | No | No | Yes | ? | No | No | No | No | No | ? | No | ? | No | Yes | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| XNU | No | No | No | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| SPARTAN kernel | ? | No | No | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | No | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | Yes | Yes | ? | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| FreeRTOS kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | No | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Zircon | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |

## Supported GPU processors

| Kernel name | Intel | NVIDIA | AMD | ARM | Qualcomm | Imagination Technologies | Broadcom | VeriSilicon |
| Kernel name | Intel HD/Iris Graphics | GeForce/Quadro/Tesla | Radeon | Mali | Adreno | PowerVR | VideoCore4 | Vivante |
| Linux kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | 2D only | Yes | Yes |
| Windows NT kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Windows Phone 8.x, Windows 10 Mobile, Windows on ARM | Yes | No | Yes |
| XNU | via I/O Kit (macOS only) | via I/O Kit (macOS only) | via I/O Kit (macOS only) | via I/O Kit (macOS only) | No | via I/O Kit (iOS only) | No | No |

## Supported kernel execution environment

This table indicates, for each kernel, what operating systems' executable images and device drivers can be run by that kernel.
| Kernel name | Linux | Darwin | Windows NT | FreeBSD | NetBSD | Solaris | OSF/1 | Amiga Unix | SunOS | BSD/OS | iBCS2 systems | IRIX | Ultrix | NDIS | SVR4 |
| FreeBSD kernel | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| Linux kernel | Yes | No | (Longene) | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | (NDISwrapper) | No |
| NetBSD kernel | Yes | No? ? | No? ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| OpenBSD kernel | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | Yes |
| Windows NT kernel | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No |
| ReactOS kernel | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | ? | No |
| XNU | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |

## Supported cipher algorithms

This may be usable on some situations like file system encrypting.
| Kernel name | DES | AES | Blowfish | Triple DES | Serpent | Twofish | CAST-128 | DES-X | IDEA | RC2 | RC5 | SEED | Skipjack | TEA | XTEA | CAST-256 | RC4 | Camellia | Anubis | KHAZAD | Salsa20 | FCrypt |
| DragonFly BSD kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| FreeBSD kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| Linux | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Windows NT kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No |
| macOS XNU Kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |

## Supported compression algorithms

This may be usable on some situations like compression file system.
| Kernel name | Deflate | zlib | LZO | LZJB | gzip | zstd |
| Linux | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| NetBSD kernel | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes |
| Solaris kernel | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? |

## Supported message digest algorithms

| Kernel name | CRC-32 (IEEE) | CRC32c | MD2 | MD4 | MD5 | SHA-1 | SHA-2 | SHA-3 | Michael MIC | Poly1305 | RIPEMD-128 | RIPEMD-160 | RIPEMD-256 | RIPEMD-320 | Tiger | Whirlpool | HMAC | MDC-2 | GOST | LASH | VMAC |
| Linux | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Partial | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | Yes |
| Solaris kernel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | No | ? | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | ? |
| FreeBSD kernel | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| XNU kernel | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Kernel name | CRC-32 (IEEE) | CRC32c | MD2 | MD4 | MD5 | SHA-1 | SHA-2 | SHA-3 | Michael MIC | Poly1305 | RIPEMD-128 | RIPEMD-160 | RIPEMD-256 | RIPEMD-320 | Tiger | Whirlpool | HMAC | MDC2 | GOST | LASH | VMAC |

## Supported Bluetooth protocols

| Kernel name | ACL | SCO | LMP | HCI | L2CAP | BNEP | RFComm. | SDP | TCP | AVTCP | AVDTP | OBEX | CMTP | HIDP | HCRP | CAPI | PPP |
| FreeBSD kernel | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Linux | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? |
| macOS XNU Kernel | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Kernel name | ACL | SCO | LMP | HCI | L2CAP | BNEP | RFComm. | SDP | TCP | AVTCP | AVDTP | OBEX | CMTP | HIDP | HCRP | CAPI | PPP |

## Audio support

| Kernel name | Audio system | in-kernel mixer | in-kernel filter |
| Linux | ALSA | ? | ? |
| Windows NT kernel | MME / WDM audio / Kernel Streaming (KS) | dropped (KMixer.sys) | KS Filters |
| FreeBSD kernel | OSS API | VCHANs in OSS API | ? |
| NetBSD kernel | native (Sun-like) / OSS API | audio_system | ? |
| Solaris kernel | Sun audio API / OSS API | Yes | ? |

## Graphics support

| Kernel name | Framebuffer | Display management | Display Mux | GPU scheduler | GPU memory management | in-kernel Remote Desktop |
| Linux | Linux framebuffer (fbdev) / Direct Rendering Manager | Kernel Mode Setting | VGA Switcheroo | DRM sched | DMA-BUF | No |
| Windows NT kernel | Dxgkrnl.sys | VidPN Manager in Dxgkrnl.sys | ? | VidSch in Dxgkrnl | VidMm in Dxgkrnl.sys, Dxgmms1.sys, and Dxgmms2.sys | RdpDD.sys / RdpWD.sys |