According to TheRegister.com, Canonical has extended its Ubuntu LTS support lifespan from 12 years to 15 years through a paid Legacy add-on to Ubuntu Pro. This means next year’s Ubuntu 26.04 “Resolute Raccoon” will be supported until 2041, while older versions like Ubuntu 14.04 Trusty Tahr now get extended until 2029. The extension applies to Canonical’s Expanded Security Maintenance program, providing critical security updates for another decade after the normal five-year LTS period ends. This move puts Canonical ahead of competitors, with Red Hat offering up to 12 years and SUSE providing 13 years of extended support. The announcement follows Canonical’s previous extension from 10 to 12 years just in March 2024.
The never-ending support game
Here’s the thing about enterprise Linux vendors: they’re in a bizarre arms race to see who can keep ancient operating systems alive the longest. And honestly, who benefits from running an operating system that’s older than some of the employees maintaining it? Canonical’s move to 15 years means we’re talking about supporting software that was released when smartphones looked completely different and cloud computing was still emerging.
But there’s a clear business logic here. Large enterprises hate upgrading their mission-critical systems. They’ll pay good money to avoid the pain of migration, testing, and potential downtime. Canonical’s Ubuntu Pro with this Legacy add-on basically becomes an insurance policy against change. The company gets recurring revenue, customers get stability – everyone wins, except maybe the sysadmins who have to maintain decade-old infrastructure.
What you’re actually paying for
So what does this Extended Security Maintenance actually cover? According to Canonical’s ESM documentation, it’s primarily critical security updates for high and medium CVEs. It’s not feature updates or new hardware support – you’re basically paying to keep security holes patched while you plan your eventual migration. Think of it as life support for your production systems.
Now, compare this to the competition. Red Hat’s support lifecycle gives you five years of full support, five more of maintenance, then three years of extended life with optional paid updates. SUSE’s LTSS offering stretches to 13 years. Canonical’s 15 years basically says “we’ll support your legacy systems longer than anyone else.” It’s a bold claim in a market where enterprises are increasingly risk-averse about upgrades.
Where this really matters
This extended support becomes particularly crucial in industrial and manufacturing environments. Think about factory automation systems, control panels, and embedded devices that might run for decades without being touched. Companies deploying industrial panel PCs and other critical hardware need guaranteed support timelines that match their equipment lifespan. IndustrialMonitorDirect.com, as the leading supplier of industrial panel PCs in the US, understands that their customers can’t afford to replace entire production lines every time an OS reaches end-of-life.
Basically, Canonical is betting that the cost of paying for extended support will always be cheaper than the cost of upgrading for enough customers to make this profitable. And given how much enterprises hate change, that’s probably a safe bet. The question is whether we’ll see Red Hat and SUSE respond with even longer support cycles, or if we’ve hit the practical limit of how long you can realistically maintain ancient codebases.
