CentOS 8 was released on September 24th, 2019. It is derived from Red Hat Enterprise Linux which was released on May 7th, 2019.
As you are aware, CentOS is a community-supported enterprise operating system, compatible with its upstream source Red Hat Enterprise Linux, from the CentOS Project.
Architecture
Contents
The build release would be available for:
x86_64
ppc64le (Little Endian
aarch64 (ARM 64, ARMv8)
New Features
There are notable differences between EL-8 and EL-7 in Kernel, package repository format, and lots of new features that EL-7 do not have.
Since CentOS 8 is derived from RHEL 8, you would get the features of RHEL 8.
- The Cockpit is now available by default
- CentOS 8 comes with a new version of the YUM version which is based on DNF. This new version is compatible with YUM v3 (CentOS 7)
- RPM v4.14 is distributed in CentOS 8. RPM now validates the whole package contents before starting the installation
- CentOS 8 contents are available through the two main repositories: BaseOS and Application Stream (AppStream)
- It supports up to 4PB of physical memory
- Wayland is the default display server instead of the Xorg server in CentOS 8
- XFS now supports shared copy-on-write data extents
- nftables replaces iptables as the default network filtering framework
- Python 3.6 is the default Python version in CentOS 8
- PHP 7.2 comes with CentOS 8
- Nginx 1.14 is available in core repository in CentOS 8
You can read detailed information about the new features here.
Download CentOS 8
The CentOS Project offers two distribution in this new release, namely CentOS Linux and CentOS Stream.
CentOS Linux
CentOS Linux is a stable release, derived from the source of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It is fully compatible with its upstream product.
This release is the regular one we use for a production environment.
Download CentOS Linux 8 (Stable Release)
CentOS Stream
CentOS Stream is a rolling release which acts as a midstream between upstream development in Fedora Linux and the downstream development for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. In simple words, this release is a testing or development release for the next minor release of RHEL.
Fedora Linux >> CentOS Stream >> RHEL Release >> CentOS Linux
Download CentOS Stream (Rolling Release)
Install CentOS 8
READ: Step by Step Guide To Install CentOS 8 (With ScreenShots)
Upgrade From CentOS 7 to CentOS 8
Soon, this section will be updated with a link to the step by step guide to upgrade from CentOS 7 to CentOS 8.
READ: How To Upgrade From CentOS 7 To CentOS 8
Conclusion
That’s All. After installing CentOS 8, do check out articles of CentOS 8 to get most out of your OS installation.