I’m totally new to Linux and just heard that a major version will be coming out. What’s the implication for distros like Fedora when the kernel 7.0 is released later in 2026? What is the timeframe for major distros to adopt the latest kernel? Pop!_OS?
1 Like
Too early to know for certain.
Like anything, major distros will update their OS in due time.
The way you’re asking like this is a concern. Why?
3 Likes
I’m not concerned at all. Just curious how this all works. Have any of the major distros made any announcements pertaining to the next major update?
1 Like
I would have framed the main post differently if the ask is out of curiosity. But alright.
All I know is it’ll happen and I’m sure distros have internal processes to add this in whenever they feel it’s ready to. I personally don’t think too much of it as there is a level of trust I rely upon.
2 Likes
Usually the jump from .19 to .0 is no more special than any other update. Afaik Torvalds jokingly says that it is because he doesn’t have more than 20 fingers and toes and can only count from 0-19.
And usually users of a distro won’t really notice any changes to the kernel unless it fixes something they’re having problems with. Most normal users won’t notice a 5% increase in for example I/O.
7 Likes
That is somewhere within the ballpark:
Numerophobia would be a more accurate term.
2 Likes
Does it matter? It’s just a forum.
1 Like
Not really. I misunderstood your intention of the post given the framing and sentence structure, is all.
2 Likes
There’s nothing special about major kernel versions. It’s just a number. Most rolling releases will probably update in about a week. Fixed releases will probably update with the next release. If you’re using Debian, you’ve got a year to go.
2 Likes
I wasn’t really sure how Linux versioning worked either so thanks for asking. Also I think your question was framed in a normal and reasonable way
2 Likes
The first digit changing doesn’t actually have much significance, it doesn’t indicate what it does with most other software (there is no real difference between a change from 6.8 → 6.9 compared to a change from 6.x → 7.0
Unlike most other software, 6.x to 7.x is not meant to convey a more significant update.
As an example here is the logic behind the change from 4.xx to 5.0:
[Linus Torvalds]
The numbering change is not indicative of anything special. If you
want to have an official reason, it’s that I ran out of fingers and
toes to count on, so 4.21 became 5.0.and there isn’t any major particular feature that made for the release
numbering either.So go wild. Make up your own reason for why it’s 5.0.
TL;DR Kernel updates generally are (and should be) boring and mostly invisible to most end users.
As for Fedora, new versions (of the distro) are released every 6 months. But you typically don’t wait that long for kernel version updates. Fedora has a pretty aggressive policy on Kernel updates almost on par with rolling release distros, so you typically don’t have to wait too long. (For example, the 6.6 stable release was on Oct 29, 2023, and Fedora released it the next day Oct 30)
Other distros manage this in their own ways (more conservative distros or distros intended for production usage) will have more stable and conservative kernel update policies, and at the other end of the spectrum ‘rolling release’ distros will adopt new kernels almost as soon as they are released.
8 Likes