The beta release of AlmaLinux 10.1 is now available. These test builds feature performance enhancements, updated tools, and security patches, and are ready for download for x86_64, ARM64, ppc64le, and s390x architectures. Live images with popular desktop environments, alongside images for Raspberry Pi, containers, and WSL, will be available soon.

The AlmaLinux Story

AlmaLinux was created by CloudLinux in response to Red Hat's decision to discontinue support for CentOS 8 ahead of schedule. The project is managed by the non-profit AlmaLinux OS Foundation, ensuring it remains a free, community-driven, and neutral platform. All development is open-source and available on GitHub.

What's New in AlmaLinux 10.1 Beta?

Full Btrfs Filesystem Support

The most significant update is the introduction of full support for the Btrfs filesystem. Btrfs is a modern copy-on-write (CoW) filesystem known for its fault tolerance, data recovery features, and ease of administration, making it a popular default choice in distributions like Fedora and openSUSE.

Btrfs support now spans both kernel and userspace, allowing you to install AlmaLinux OS with a Btrfs filesystem from the get-go. While initial support is focused on the installer and storage management stack, broader integration of Btrfs features across AlmaLinux software is planned for the near future.
The AlmaLinux Team

To use Btrfs, simply select custom partitioning during installation and choose it as your filesystem. While the default XFS-LVM configuration remains an excellent choice for traditional, high-performance enterprise workloads, Btrfs is ideal for flexible environments where data integrity and easy rollbacks are critical.

Updated Toolchains and Components

Toolchains: GCC 14.3.1, GCC Toolset 15, LLVM Toolset 20.1.8, Rust Toolset 1.88.0, and GDB 16.3
Runtimes: Python 3.12.11 and Node.js 24
System & Networking: NetworkManager 1.54.0, Samba 4.22.4, rsyslog 8.2506.0, and Mesa 25.0.7
Security: OpenSSL 3.5.1, SELinux-policy 42.1.7, SSSD 2.11.1, and Crypto-policies 20250804

Enhanced RHEL Compatibility

AlmaLinux maintains ABI binary compatibility with Red Hat Enterprise Linux, serving as a direct replacement for RHEL and CentOS Stream. The distribution has been streamlined by removing RHEL-specific packages such as redhat-*, insights-client, and subscription-manager-migration*. It also expands hardware support, adding drivers for a wider range of devices.

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