The AlmaLinux OS Foundation is releasing a side-by-side package drop, presenting the "Olive Jaguar" stable release 9.8 with the 5.14.0-687.5.3.el9_8 kernel and AlmaLinux 10.2, nicknamed "Lavender Lion" powered by the 6.12.0-211.7.3.el10_2 kernel. Previously, the second release tended to trail the first by about a week, so moving to a concurrent release is one of the foundation's 2026 goals. Anyone curious about the 2026 aims should read this blog post.
New features in Olive Jaguar
AlmaLinux 9.8 "Olive Jaguar" ships with fresh compiler toolsets, refreshed module streams, and tightened security. A number of packages receive updated versions along with various tweaks and fixes, including an ALESCo-approved kernel backport ahead of upstream. The ISO images target ARM64, IBM Z, IBM PowerPC, and 64-bit Intel/AMD platforms. The full release notes are accessible on the linked page.
Lavender Lion and its parallel build
Even though it supports the same architectures, AlmaLinux 10.2 "Lavender Lion" also comes with a parallel Intel/AMD build that matches EPEL coverage for older hardware. The key highlights include updated compiler toolsets, new language and database packages, and improved security. Thanks to i686 userspace packages now in a stable stage, AlmaLinux 10.2 enables legacy 32-bit software and CI pipelines, as well as containerized workloads. The full release notes can be found here.
Cloud, container, and live images
In addition to the above, it should be noted that a variety of cloud, container, and live images are available for both releases (see the Source link for details). This ensures versatile deployment options across environments while maintaining compatibility and ongoing updates.
Source: almalinux.org