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⇱ Linux 6.18 Officially Promoted To Being An LTS Kernel - Phoronix

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Linux 6.18 Officially Promoted To Being An LTS Kernel

Written by Michael Larabel in Linux Kernel on 3 December 2025 at 10:32 AM EST. 17 Comments
Not exactly a big surprise but the recently released Linux 6.18 kernel is now officially promoted to being this year's Long Term Support "LTS" kernel.

Linux stable kernel lead maintainer Greg Kroah-Hartman today officially committed to Linux 6.18 being a long-term supported kernel version.

The kernel.org releases page now has Linux 6.18 being an LTS kernel maintained by Greg Kroah-Hartman and Sasha Levin.

👁 Linux LTS kernels


For the moment Linux 6.18 LTS is marked as being maintained for two years through December 2027. That could potentially be extended longer depending upon how much enterprise adoption and support there is in testing of Linux 6.18 LTS release candidates, backporting, etc. But for now at least Linux 6.18 LTS will be supported for the next 24 months.

The Linux LTS kernel version each year is typically determined as the last major kernel version release of that calendar year. So it's hardly a surprise Linux 6.18 is LTS and was already expected, but now it's official. Linux 6.18 LTS features many exciting features while Linux 6.19 stable won't be out until February.

Michael Larabel is the principal author of Phoronix.com and founded the site in 2004 with a focus on enriching the Linux hardware experience. Michael has written more than 20,000 articles covering the state of Linux hardware support, Linux performance, graphics drivers, and other topics. Michael is also the lead developer of the Phoronix Test Suite, Phoromatic, and OpenBenchmarking.org automated benchmarking software. He can be followed via Twitter, LinkedIn, or contacted via MichaelLarabel.com.