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It's always been easy for programmers to get started with Linux. Just download one of the many free distros, learn some C, and you're in business.
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Learning how to use Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) was a bit harder. Fortunately, Red Hat made it easy for developers to get started. In 2016, the Linux giant started offering free RHEL to members of its Red Hat Developer Program. Then, in 2021, after closing CentOS, Red Hat began offering free RHEL to small development teams. Now, Red Hat is unveiling a new offering, Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Business Developers.
So, why yet another free offering? This program aims to make RHEL more accessible to business-focused development teams working outside traditional IT. This move, announced on July 9, 2025, aims to foster greater consistency between development and production environments while reducing friction across hybrid cloud IT estates. The goal is to ease the transition of applications into production and reduce operational friction between business groups and IT.
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As Gunnar Hellekson, Red Hat VP and general manager of RHEL, said in a statement: "Modern developers need to be able to move at their own pace to deliver innovative applications, but must do so without increasing friction with IT operations teams or production systems. RHEL for Business Developers helps empower developers with direct access to the world's leading enterprise Linux platform without having to move through centralized IT channels, giving them a more consistent, reliable foundation that aligns with the business's demands for production-readiness."
With this program, each registered Red Hat Developer Program user can run up to 25 physical, virtual, or cloud-based instances. Besides the Linux distribution, the package includes signed developer content featuring modern open-source programming languages, tools, and databases essential for next-generation enterprise applications.
Developers will also have full access to Podman Desktop. This is Red Hat's preferred tool for developing RHEL containers. This package includes the ability to create bootable container images.
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Red Hat's latest announcement builds upon a suite of free and low-cost RHEL access options that have evolved in recent years. These are:
Red Hat Developer Subscription for Individuals: This long-standing, no-cost program enables individual developers to use RHEL for personal development and testing purposes. Users can register up to 16 physical or virtual nodes and receive full access to updates, fixes, and self-service support via the Red Hat Customer Portal.
Developer Subscription for Teams: Larger organizations can access a broader set of RHEL entitlements for development and lab environments, typically coordinated through a Red Hat account representative.
Production Use for Small Workloads: Since early 2021, Red Hat has permitted free RHEL use for production workloads on up to 16 systems in response to community feedback following the discontinuation of CentOS Linux. This applies to both servers and desktops, and extends to major public clouds.
To take advantage of these programs, developers and organizations must:
Register for a Red Hat account and join the Red Hat Developer Program.
Download RHEL from the Red Hat Developer website.
Attach the developer subscription to their systems using the provided tools and documentation.
Renew the subscription annually as required.
Red Hat's expansion of free and self-serve RHEL access is seen, as Red Hat would have it, as a response to the evolving needs of modern software teams. Others believe it's because of the competitive pressures following the end of CentOS Linux. For example, many enterprise Linux users have turned to RHEL clones, such as AlmaLinux OS, Rocky Linux, and SUSE Multi-Linux Support, formerly known as Liberty Linux.
By empowering developers to work directly on the same platform as production, Red Hat hopes to maintain its position as the enterprise Linux of choice and ensure a smooth pathway from development to deployment.