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    Alibaba Cloud Linux:What is Alibaba Cloud Linux

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    Alibaba Cloud Linux:What is Alibaba Cloud Linux

    Last Updated:Dec 16, 2025

    Alibaba Cloud Linux is a Linux server operating system distribution built by Alibaba Cloud. It provides a stable, secure, and high-performance environment for applications and incorporates enhancements from the open-source community. The distribution is deeply optimized for Alibaba Cloud infrastructure, and Alibaba Cloud provides up to 10 years of enterprise-grade support and maintenance for a superior operating system experience.

    For more information, see the Alibaba Cloud Linux product page.

    Usage notes

    Alibaba Cloud Linux is suitable for:

    • A wide range of instance families, including Elastic Compute Service (ECS) Bare Metal Instances. For more information, see Instance families.

      • Supports instances with 1 to 768 vCPUs.

      • Supports instances with 0.5 GiB to 12,288 GiB of memory.

      • Does not support non-I/O-optimized instances.

    • Various cloud workloads, such as databases, data analytics, cloud-native containers, web applications, and other workloads in a production environment.

    Billing

    Alibaba Cloud Linux is a free-to-use image. When you use an Alibaba Cloud Linux image to create an ECS instance, you are charged for other resources, such as vCPUs, memory, storage, public bandwidth, and snapshots. For more information, see Billing overview.

    Security advisories

    Alibaba Cloud Linux Security Advisories

    Support lifecycle

    Version

    End of support date

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 4

    2038-06-30

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 3

    2031-04-30

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 2

    2024-03-31

    Alibaba Cloud Linux images

    Distribution

    Image name

    Image description

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 4

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 4 LTS 64-bit

    Default standard image for the x86 architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 4 LTS 64-bit

    Default standard image for the ARM architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 4 LTS 64-bit Container Optimized Edition

    A standard image optimized for container use cases on the x86 architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 4 LTS 64-bit Container Optimized ARM Edition

    A standard image optimized for container use cases on the ARM architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 3

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 3.2104 64-bit

    Default standard image for the x86 architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 3.2104 64-bit Quick Launch Edition

    This custom image supports Quick Boot (Qboot). Based on the Alibaba Cloud Kernel, it boots the virtual machine directly from the kernel. ECS instances created from this image boot significantly faster than those created from other images. The default runtime is identical to that of the standard image. Notes about the Quick Launch Edition image:

    • It accelerates only the initial startup of the instance. Subsequent startups are not accelerated.

    • It accelerates kernel boot speeds by optimizing memory initialization and modularizing boot-time components like mouse devices.

    • It uses the latest AliyunInit service to replace the Cloud-init service, which reduces the OS initialization time.

    • You cannot modify this image's kernel.

    • Unsupported instance families: GPU-accelerated compute-optimized, vGPU-accelerated, FPGA compute-optimized, NPU compute-optimized, heterogeneous service, Super Computing Cluster (SCC), and security-enhanced instance family.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 3.2104 64-bit UEFI Edition

    Based on the default standard image for the x86 architecture. It supports only the UEFI boot mode.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 3.2104 64-bit ARM Edition

    Default standard image for the ARM architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 2

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 2.1903 LTS 64-bit

    Default standard image for the x86 architecture.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 2.1903 LTS 64-bit Quick Launch Edition

    This custom image supports Quick Boot (Qboot). Based on the Alibaba Cloud Kernel, it boots the virtual machine directly from the kernel. ECS instances created from this image boot significantly faster than those created from other images. The default runtime is identical to that of the standard image. Notes about the Quick Launch Edition image:

    • It accelerates only the initial startup of the instance. Subsequent startups are not accelerated.

    • It accelerates kernel boot speeds by optimizing memory initialization and modularizing boot-time components like mouse devices.

    • It uses the latest AliyunInit service to replace the Cloud-init service, which reduces the OS initialization time.

    • You cannot modify this image's kernel.

    • Unsupported instance families: GPU-accelerated compute-optimized, vGPU-accelerated, FPGA compute-optimized, NPU compute-optimized, heterogeneous service, Super Computing Cluster (SCC), and security-enhanced instance family.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 2.1903 LTS 64-bit UEFI Edition

    Based on the default standard image for the x86 architecture. It supports only the UEFI boot mode.

    Alibaba Cloud Linux 2.1903 64-bit Trusted Edition

    Based on the default standard image for the x86 architecture. This image supports Alibaba Cloud trusted instances.

    For the latest image IDs for Alibaba Cloud Linux, see Alibaba Cloud Linux 4 image release notes, Alibaba Cloud Linux 3 image release notes, and Alibaba Cloud Linux 2 image release notes.

    References