Canonical announced the introduction of a 12-year period of updates for Ubuntu LTS. This extension will apply to all relevant LTS versions, starting with Ubuntu 14.04. The support for Ubuntu 14.04, which was originally set to expire in April of this year, has now been extended to April 2026. Subsequent LTS versions will also receive extended support, with updates for Ubuntu 24.04 continuing until 2036, Ubuntu 22.04 until 2034, Ubuntu 20.04 until 2032, and so on. Updates will be publicly available for 5 years after release, with the remaining 7 years exclusively available to Ubuntu Pro service users.
The Ubuntu Pro service is designed for commercial applications and requires payment. However, for personal use, there is an option for free access to Ubuntu Pro, allowing updates for up to 5 machines. Official Ubuntu Community members can receive free updates for 50 devices.
Other distributions also offer extended support periods, such as the 14-year support provided for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (10 years + 4 additional years of paid service). SUSE Linux offers 13 years of support (10 years General + 3 years LTSS), while Debian GNU/Linux provides 7 years of support (5 years LTS + 2 years Extended LTS). Opensuse offers support for 18 months, and Fedora Linux provides support for 13 months.