The words Red Hat 7 End of Life may sound ominous to any IT team, but they are not an immediate cause for concern. Understanding the reasons for its deprecation is crucial for contextualizing its importance.
Firstly, it's important to remember the difference between End of Maintenance (EOM) and End of Life (EOL). When a product reaches EOM, its users lose access to critical and important impact security advisories (RHSAs) and urgent priority bug fix advisories (RHBAs). Red Hat 7 will reach End of Maintenance on June 30, 2024.
On the other hand, EOL occurs when a product or service is directly discontinued. This means that organizations will need to migrate their operating system to a newer one if they wish to continue receiving support, updates, and security fixes. Red Hat 7 EOL is set to occur when the Extended Life Cycle Support is finished. This will happen on June 30, 2028.