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it_user1571253 - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
May 23, 2021
Useful Red Hat Satellite deployments, integrates well, and very stable
Pros and Cons
  • "We find the Red Hat Satellite deployments very useful. It integrates well with other solutions."
  • "It could be a bit more user-friendly. It could also be cheaper."

What is our primary use case?

We are using it for application services.

What is most valuable?

We find the Red Hat Satellite deployments very useful. It integrates well with other solutions.

What needs improvement?

It could be a bit more user-friendly. It could also be cheaper.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is very stable. It is more stable than Windows Server.

Buyer's Guide
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
June 2026
Learn what your peers think about Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: June 2026.
900,838 professionals have used our research since 2012.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is scalable. The number of users would be in thousands. They include IT teams and end-users who obviously don't even know that they're using it.

How are customer service and support?

I don't call them directly, but their technical support is good. 

How was the initial setup?

It was straightforward. Our deployments are automated. To deploy a build internally, it only takes half an hour, but that's usually in automation. It would probably take a couple of months to put the infrastructure in place to be able to deploy it.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

We have a site license on a yearly basis. Generally, we're okay with its price, but everything could be cheaper.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this solution to others. I would advise others to do their research before deploying it and make sure that they are up to speed with the OS and what it can do. It is fairly easy to use as long as you know what you're doing.

I would rate Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Associate Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Jan 15, 2021
A Linux distribution solution with good customer support
Pros and Cons
  • "Customer support is valuable."
  • "Of all those Linux systems, I think RHEL is much better, but I find Ubuntu much easier to use than RHEL."
  • "Their pricing and documentation can be improved."
  • "RHEL is expensive. The servers or cloud images are quite expensive."

What is our primary use case?

We deploy front-end and back-end software applications on RHEL, and it's our app server. Most of our app servers and our production servers are on RHEL. They're running on RHEL, and that's why they are profiting from it. I2C is the issuer in the processing payment industry. Basically, we do the issuer processing for credit cards, and all the bank magic that happens when you swipe a credit card is handled by us. We're also using RHEL servers for processing debit card payments.

What is most valuable?

Customer support is valuable. Because most of the Linux distros are open source, most of them don't have customer support. RHEL isn't open source, and that's why I prefer it more than other distros.

What needs improvement?

Their pricing and documentation can be improved. They need to have developer variance that's more developer-friendly and less costly. They have a free developer version, but that's very limited in terms of features from RHEL. They also need to build their own open source community.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using RHEL for about four months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

RHEL is very stable. Unlike Kali-Linux or Solaris, RHEL solutions are very stable. We have licensed projects, and they must be stable to provide all customers with instructions. They're stable, compared to other Linux options too.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It's very scalable. When you're using the right machine and the right settings or right parameters, it's highly scalable

How are customer service and support?

Technical support from their customer service team is very good. They give responses unlike other Linux distros, and I think RHEL has better customer support.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

My current company was using Solaris before. I was using Core Linux for three to four years. From Ubuntu, I shifted to RHEL and Solaris because I changed companies and jobs. We are using RHEL and Solaris in my current job, and I had to shift to these operating systems.

I have used the Ubuntu Linux base, I have used Kali-Linux and Debian. Of all those Linux systems, I think RHEL is much better, but I find Ubuntu much easier to use than RHEL.

Ubuntu is Debian-based, and Red Hat is, I think VM based. Another difference is open source systems have less support. Still, the community of Ubuntu is very strong and answers your query very promptly. But Red Hat is a certified, licensed product, and customer support from them is very good.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

RHEL is expensive. The servers or cloud images are quite expensive. But I guess the client groups they target can afford that kind of a license. If you're a small business owner or a student and want to shift to RHEL, you must spend a lot of dollars. The developer version of RHEL has minimal functionality, but it's given away for free.

What other advice do I have?

I would tell potential customers that they should go for the latest releases. If they want to buy it, they should get a developer account from RHEL first and use that dev account before buying it. They might have some hands-on experience before spending too much money on Red Hat.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) an eight.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Buyer's Guide
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
June 2026
Learn what your peers think about Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: June 2026.
900,838 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Linux Administrator at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Consultant
Dec 22, 2020
An excellent and inexpensive solution with great security, stability, and performance
Pros and Cons
  • "Its security is the most valuable. It is very stable and has many features. It also has good performance. Some of our clients were using Windows servers and products. I suggested Red Hat Linux to them and described the features. They switched to it, and they really loved it. There were around 50 servers in my last company, and they switched all those servers from Windows to Red Hat. I used to manage those servers."
  • "It is mostly better than other solutions. However, it is sometimes difficult for disaster recovery, so we have to plan accordingly."

What is our primary use case?

I use it for running RAID servers, Database clusters, and a lot of other open-source tools. I have also used it as a firewall.

We have on-premises dedicated servers located in some data centers. We also have cloud servers on the public cloud. I am currently using the latest version, and I have also worked on previous versions as well as Template.

What is most valuable?

Its security is the most valuable. It is very stable and has many features. It also has good performance.

Some of our clients were using Windows servers and products. I suggested Red Hat Linux to them and described the features. They switched to it, and they really loved it. There were around 50 servers in my last company, and they switched all those servers from Windows to Red Hat. I used to manage those servers.

What needs improvement?

It is mostly better than other solutions. However, it is sometimes difficult for disaster recovery, so we have to plan accordingly.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working on Linux for the past ten years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Based on my experience, it has been stable. I did not experience any issues.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is scalable. I scaled it in a way that I put a load balancer and a few servers running behind that. When working with clients, we scale or expand usage based on the need.

I used to work on and manage a website, which was just like YouTube. Around 1,000 users used to use the site, which was definitely putting a load on this server. There were around 30 servers managing the traffic. I could manage 1,000 simultaneous users.

How are customer service and technical support?

I have never used their support. I just do some research to resolve an issue.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have also used Ubuntu and CentOS in different companies and for different clients. The utilization of packages, commands, and configuration files are different in Ubuntu. For example, if you want to restart a service, the commands are different in these solutions. They also have different firewalls. Red Hat uses firewalld and Ubuntu uses ufw.

How was the initial setup?

The deployment is actually okay. It is not too easy and not too complex. It is easy for experienced people, but if you don't have the experience, it can be a little hard. 

The deployment duration depends on the type of deployment that we are doing. It could take from a day to a week or two weeks. We can also use Jenkins for auto-deployment.

What about the implementation team?

I worked with a Cloud hosting and deployment company that provided different Cloud services to their clients. They had servers based on Red Hat. It does require regular maintenance. We had a team of ten people.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Red Hat Linux is inexpensive. Linux solutions are generally inexpensive.

What other advice do I have?

I would definitely recommend this solution. It is my most preferred solution. I like using terminals, and with Red Hat, I get to work on terminals and shell commands. It has good security. 

I would rate Red Hat Linux (RHEL) an eight out of ten. I find it excellent, but no system can be 100% perfect.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Growth Incubation Leader, Poland and Baltics at IBM
Vendor
Top 20
Apr 15, 2018
Open architecture allows for accelerated growth while secure repositories guarantee stability
Pros and Cons
  • "Open architecture allows for accelerated growth while secure repositories guarantee stability."
  • "Workstations: More applications for graphics."
  • "Servers: More applications for monitoring (e.g., nmon)."

What is our primary use case?

Business: workstation and server.

How has it helped my organization?

Open architecture allows for accelerated growth while secure repositories guarantee stability.

What is most valuable?

  • Multipath
  • Yum 
  • LVM
  • Selinux

What needs improvement?

Workstations: More applications for graphics.

Servers: More applications for monitoring (e.g., nmon).

For how long have I used the solution?

More than five years.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Software Engineer at a security firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Mar 11, 2018
GUI for network adapters, and built-in tools such as Mozilla browser, are key for us
Pros and Cons
  • "The GUI for network adapters and built-in tools provided by RHEL, such as the Mozilla browser, have been valuable. Since they come built-in, it saves the time of having to install them, and you have everything necessary with the installation itself."
  • "Until now, RHEL has been the most stable OS I have ever seen. Nothing seems to break, with frequent updates. I have been running it 24/7 for the past 18 months and it runs flawlessly."
  • "Until now, RHEL has been the most stable OS I have ever seen."
  • "I really think that the upgrade policies between the major versions, like from from RHEL 5 to RHEL 6, should be much easier, similar to what is in place for upgrading from RHEL 6 to RHEL 6.8."

What is most valuable?

The GUI for network adapters and built-in tools provided by RHEL, such as the Mozilla browser, have been valuable. Since they come built-in, it saves the time of having to install them, and you have everything necessary with the installation itself.

There are several tools which Red Hat provides as add-ons such as ReaR (Relax and Recover) which can be used for disaster recovery.

What needs improvement?

Improvements are necessary to stay in the market and face the competition. I really think that the upgrade policies between the major versions, like from from RHEL 5 to RHEL 6, should be much easier, similar to what is in place for upgrading from RHEL 6 to RHEL 6.8.

For how long have I used the solution?

One to three years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Until now, RHEL has been the most stable OS I have ever seen. Nothing seems to break, with frequent updates. I have been running it 24/7 for the past 18 months and it runs flawlessly.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

No issues so far. You can always scale the hard disk as much as you want, add NFS, CIFS disks and still the enterprise solution would run seamlessly.

How are customer service and technical support?

I would rate technical support at eight out of ten. Though they have some excellent engineers available, the case mostly goes through level-3 support staff and then it moves forward. This can sometimes be a time consuming process and lethal for a company.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

No, we did not use a previous solution. We knew about Red Hat from our inception. It was a pretty well-known enterprise platform.

How was the initial setup?

The setup of RHEL is straightforward, there is nothing complex about it. Everything is well documented on their website.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing is a bit on the expensive side, mainly because of the support they provide. However, it is quite affordable if you are an organization. If, as a small company or individual, this is an expensive option, I would recommend CentOS, which is an exact replica of RHEL, minus the customer support.

What other advice do I have?

I have worked on a few Linux platforms, but Red Hat is a different experience. Due to its stability, it makes an excellent choice. It’s so-called invincible security makes sure that your data remains safe. The excellent customer service support agents are ready to get your problem resolved almost within an hour of opening a case (as long as you have the premium license for your servers). Taking all this into consideration, I would say this solution is a nine out of 10.

I have been working on Red-hat for two years and I must say I enjoy working with it. No day is like another, since there will always be something which will enhance your learning curve.

I would say if you are managing high-end servers running complex programs, Red Hat would never do you wrong. It has a lot of built-in tools if you choose the maximalist installation. If you are running a low-end server, you can even go with the minimalist installation which would only cramp a few megabytes of your processor power.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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it_user806466 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sales Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Real User
Mar 4, 2018
Provides a stable version of Linux with enterprise support
Pros and Cons
  • "Enterprise support is available for our customers."
  • "Rarely were there stability issues, and we regularly had servers running for three years without reboot."
  • "I only had to engage support once for an escalated issue and their support team tried to pass the blame onto our Hypervisor vendor, when it was indeed an issue with a Red Hat package."

How has it helped my organization?

The company that I worked for that employed RHEL was a PACS (Picture Archiving and Communication System - think of an image repository for x-ray, CAT scan, MRI, etc., that allowed radiologists to read the images and report on their findings). Our software was a FDA-certified medical "device," based on an open-source DICOM toolkit. We had a custom repository that served up our packages. We needed a stable, supported version of Linux since we would have to get FDA certification for each major version upgrade.

What is most valuable?

Enterprise support is available for our customers. Pre-RHEL, I used Red Hat desktop for personal PC.

What needs improvement?

Support.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Rarely were there stability issues. We regularly had servers running for three years without reboot.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Yes, there were scalability issues, but I blame that more on my employer than on Red Hat.

How are customer service and technical support?

Support seemed to be great for day-to-day issues that our customers would experience (the customer would engage Red Hat support and escalate to me if there was no resolution). I only had to engage support once for an escalated issue and their support team tried to pass the blame onto our Hypervisor vendor, when it was indeed an issue with a Red Hat package.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have used lots of flavors of Linux going back to 1995. Enterprise support was the reason Red Hat was selected.

How was the initial setup?

Easy. Used Kickstart to automate installation and post install config.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

 I was an engineer, never discussed pricing.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

CentOS, Slack, Ubuntu, Arch, LFS.

What other advice do I have?

My advice: Kickstart is your friend.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Storage and VMware Expert at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Aug 24, 2017
It's improved our company's system environments that run Oracle databases.
Pros and Cons
  • "Red Hat has improved the mission critical environments running Oracle databases, while CentOS has improved our web environment and MySQL."
  • "The licensing valor is too high and must be improved"

What is most valuable?

Red Hat is mission critical to our environment.

How has it helped my organization?

Red Hat has improved the mission critical environments running Oracle databases, while CentOS has improved our web environment and MySQL.

What needs improvement?

Oracle and SAP Environment and all HPC environments.

For how long have I used the solution?

10 years

What was my experience with deployment of the solution?

No issues

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Very stable i don´t find any problem we have many environment using redhat since first version.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Not encountered problem with scalability

How are customer service and technical support?

Customer Service:

The customer service is good and all problem was solved, i dont have any problem

Technical Support:

Very good

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We have many kinds of the linux version on the all environment but to HPC environment we use Redhat but all another versions work very well

What about the implementation team?

I work with the two scenario

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The licensing valor is too high and must be improved

What other advice do I have?

Red Hat is similar to CentOS, except that CentOS doesn't offer to support certain solutions, such as Oracle.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
it_user715155 - PeerSpot reviewer
Works at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Consultant
Aug 13, 2017
Open source stable Linux OS
Pros and Cons
  • "Stable Linux OS. The stability of the OS is very important for the computer system."
  • "Many areas in version 5 are obsolete such as filesystem ext2, ext3, while the new versions (v.6, 7) support ext4, Btrfs, ZFS, etc."

What is most valuable?

Stable Linux OS. The stability of the OS is very important for the computer system. Unstable means you never know when it will crash or fail while your valuable data and business applications are running.

How has it helped my organization?

It's an open source solution.

What needs improvement?

Many areas in version 5 are obsolete such as filesystem ext2, ext3, while the new versions (v.6, 7) support ext4, Btrfs, ZFS, etc.

For how long have I used the solution?

10 years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

No.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

No.

How are customer service and technical support?

No technical support.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

No.

How was the initial setup?

No.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

No more support and licensing.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

No.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Principle consultant at Active Data Consulting Services Pty Ltd
Real User
Top 20Leaderboard
Jul 5, 2017
Absolutely rock solid performance, security, stability and reliability.
Pros and Cons
  • "RedHat Enterprise Linux has been running mission critical systems in my organization now for nearly 8 years, in a 24 x 7 environment, and during this time we have never, ever had any of our servers fail to function as needed."

    What is most valuable?

    Absolutely rock solid performance, security, stability and reliability, essential features for a business that needs to mission critical applications in a 24 x 7 environment.

    Plethora of useful tools and services that just make getting the job done a lot less time consuming.

    How has it helped my organization?

    RedHat Enterprise Linux has been running mission critical systems in my organization now for nearly 8 years, in a 24 x 7 environment.

    During this time we have never, ever had any of our servers fail to function as needed.

    Red Hat Linux has given us five nines (99.999%) uptime for years.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I have been using Linux in various forms for 10+ years

    What was my experience with deployment of the solution?

    Mainly just the usual issues one will encounter whilst learning the platform, working out the best way to deploy and configure the servers, other than that though, the actual deployments were very straight-forward.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    None, our RHEL servers have been rock solid.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    No, we have RHEL servers of varying capacities and workloads, so far it's taken everything we can throw at it.

    How are customer service and technical support?

    Customer Service:

    The technical support subscription is absolutely worth while if you need to use RHEL in production, knowing you can get support if you need it is comforting.

    Technical Support:

    I've lodged a few support tickets over the years and always had prompt, informative responses, I would rate their support as being excellent.

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    We were using an earlier version of HP UX running on PA-RISC architecture, however we became concerned about the cost of remaining on the PA-RISC HP UX platform and possible future issues at virtualization.

    How was the initial setup?

    When setting up any Linux environment, make sure you understand how the LVM works. Other than that it was all fairly straight-forward.

    What about the implementation team?

    It was implemented in-house.

    What was our ROI?

    The uptime and reliability are the main ROI's, the product is also very competitively priced RE: Licensing, so many thousands of dollars in licensing costs alone.

    The ROI on 10 years of rock solid reliability is almost impossible to calculate.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    In Australia, you need to go through a channel partner, shop around and find a good partner that understands the licensing model well.

    Which other solutions did I evaluate?

    We evaluated HP UX 11.23, which we had been using before hand. However HP (at the time) had not delivered an x86 port of HP UX at the time when we were going to virtualization, so we needed an alternative to HP UX as we could not move into onto VMWare.

    RHEL ticked all the boxes and was support by our technology provider.

    What other advice do I have?

    Well worth a look if you want supported enterprise Linux.

    Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
    PeerSpot user
    reviewer2588328 - PeerSpot reviewer
    Linux technical leader at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees
    Real User
    Top 20
    Nov 7, 2024
    Has specific security checks that are beneficial
    Pros and Cons
    • "The security features are the most valuable."
    • "Risks, for example, specific to Linux, need improvements."

    What is our primary use case?

    I use Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) for its specific security features.

    How has it helped my organization?

    Red Hat Enterprise Linux has specific security checks that are beneficial. We follow its support and it helps with security verification.

    What is most valuable?

    The security features are the most valuable. The long-term support for weekends is also beneficial.

    What needs improvement?

    Risks, for example, specific to Linux, need improvements.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would rate Red Hat Enterprise Linux a nine out of ten.

    Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
    PeerSpot user
    Buyer's Guide
    Download our free Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
    Updated: June 2026
    Buyer's Guide
    Download our free Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.