VyOS. VyOS is an open source network operating system Linux distribution based on Debian.

VyOS provides a free routing platform that competes directly with other commercially available solutions from well-known network providers. Because VyOS is run on standard amd64 systems, it can be used as a router and firewall platform for cloud deployments. VyOS can also be optimized to achieve routing at 100Gbps.

Besides being open-source, VyOS also offers subscription-based support, which includes pre-built images for cloud and virtual environments and LTS images for the 1.3 and 1.4 series.

History
After Brocade Communications stopped development of Vyatta in 2013, a group of enthusiasts created an open-source fork called VyOS, based on the last community edition, Vyatta Core 6.6R1.

They founded Sentrium S.L, a Spanish company dedicated to providing support and development for the VyOS project. On October 9, 2024, Sentrium S.L. was renamed VyOS Networks Iberia and was acquired by VyOS Networks Corporation, becoming its subsidiary.

Features

 Routing and Protocols: BGP (IPv4 and IPv6), OSPF (v2 and v3), RIP and RIPng, policy-based routing, BGP-LU and enhanced route filtering. IPv4, IPv6, QoS.
 VPN and Tunneling: IPsec, VTI, VXLAN, L2TPv3, L2TP/IPsec and PPTP servers, tunnel interfaces (GRE, IPIP, SIT), OpenVPN in client, server, or site-to-site modes, WireGuard.
 Firewall and NAT: Stateful firewall based on nftables, zone-based firewall, all types of source and destination NAT (one to one, one to many, many to many), NAT64/DNS64.
 Network Services: DHCP and DHCPv6 server and relay, IPv6 RA, DNS forwarding, HTTP load balancer, web proxy, PPPoE access concentrator, NetFlow/sFlow sensor, TFTP server.
 High Availability and Load Balancing: VRRP for IPv4 and IPv6, ability to execute custom health checks and transition scripts; ECMP, stateful load balancing, failover routes.
 Management and Configuration: Junos-style CLI with commands like run, set, delete, show, commit, commit-confirm, compare and versioning. Rollback without reboot, PKI repository
 Automation: ansible, napalm, Netmiko, Salt Stack, cloud-init, python sdk. cloud-init ready images can be built with vyos-build or packer
 Monitoring: integrations with Zabbix, FastNetMon and Prometheus/Grafana.
 Platform and Image Support: VyOS images can be created using vyos-build for the following platforms: amd64, ISO, and cloud images for AWS, Azure, Edgecore, XCP-NG, Qemu/Proxmox, VMware.

Releases
VyOS version 1.0.0 (Hydrogen) was released on December 22, 2013. On October 9, 2014, version 1.1.0 (Helium) was released. All versions released thus far have been based on Debian 6.0 (Squeeze), and are available as 32-bit images and 64-bit images for both physical and virtual machines.

On January 28, 2019, version 1.2.0 (Crux) was released. Version 1.2.0 is based on Debian 8 (Jessie). While version 1.0 and 1.1 were named after elements, a new naming scheme based on constellations is used from version 1.2. 

VyOS 1.3.0 (Equuleus) is based on Debian 10 (Buster) and was released on December 21, 2021. Equuleus brought many long-desired features, most notably an SSTP VPN server, an IPoE server, an OpenConnect VPN server, and a serial console server. It also included reworked support for WWAN interfaces, support for GENEVE and MACSec interfaces, VRF, IS-IS routing, preliminary support for MPLS and LDP, among many other features.

Currently, VyOS 1.4.0 (Sagitta) in GA (General Access) stage, with the latest version being VyOS 1.4.0 GA LTS. This version was developed based on Debian 12 (Bookworm).

Release History

See also
List of router and firewall distributions

References

External links
 
 

Computer networking
Debian-based distributions
Ethernet
Free routing software
Free security software
Free software distributions
Gateway/routing/firewall distribution
Linux companies
Linux distributions
Routers (computing)
Routing software
Virtualization software
Virtual private networks