A
kernel is a component of a computer
operating system. A comparison of system kernels can provide insight into the design and architectural choices made by the developers of particular operating systems.
Comparison criteria
The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of widely used and currently available
operating system kernels. Please see the individual products' articles for further information.
Even though there are a large number and variety of available
Linux distribution
A Linux distribution (often abbreviated as distro) is an operating system made from a software collection that includes the Linux kernel and, often, a package management system. Linux users usually obtain their operating system by downloading one ...
s, all of these kernels are grouped under a single entry in these tables, due to the differences among them being of the patch level. See
comparison of Linux distributions for a detailed comparison. Linux distributions that have highly modified kernels — for example,
real-time computing kernels — should be listed separately. There are also a wide variety of minor BSD operating systems, many of which can be found at
comparison of BSD operating systems
There are a number of Unix-like operating systems based on or descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) series of Unix variant options. The three most notable descendants in current use are FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD, which are all ...
.
The tables specifically do not include subjective viewpoints on the merits of each kernel or operating system.
Feature overview
The major contemporary general-purpose
kernels are shown in comparison. Only an overview of the technical features is detailed.
Transport protocol support
In-kernel security
In-kernel virtualization
In-kernel server support
Binary format support
A comparison of OS support for different
binary formats (
executable
In computing, executable code, an executable file, or an executable program, sometimes simply referred to as an executable or binary, causes a computer "to perform indicated tasks according to encoded instruction (computer science), instructi ...
s):
File system support
Physical
file system
In computing, file system or filesystem (often abbreviated to fs) is a method and data structure that the operating system uses to control how data is stored and retrieved. Without a file system, data placed in a storage medium would be one larg ...
s:
Networked file system support
Supported CPU instruction sets and microarchitectures
Supported GPU processors
Supported kernel execution environment
This table indicates, for each kernel, what operating systems' executable images and device drivers can be run by that kernel.
Supported cipher algorithms
This may be usable on some situations like file system encrypting.
Supported compression algorithms
This may be usable on some situations like compression file system.
Supported message digest algorithms
Supported Bluetooth protocols
See also
*
Comparison of open source operating systems
These tables compare free software / open-source operating systems. Where not all of the versions support a feature, the first version which supports it is listed.
General information
Supported architectures
Supported hardware
Gene ...
*
Comparison of Linux distributions
*
Comparison of BSD operating systems
There are a number of Unix-like operating systems based on or descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) series of Unix variant options. The three most notable descendants in current use are FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD, which are all ...
*
Comparison of Microsoft Windows versions
Microsoft Windows is the name of several families of computer software operating systems created by Microsoft. Microsoft first introduced an operating environment named Windows in November 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing int ...
*
List of operating systems
*
Comparison of file systems
*
Comparison of operating systems
Footnotes
{{Reflist, 30em
Kernels
Computing platforms
Operating system kernels