How do I get extended lifecycle support for RHEL 7 and AL2 after their end-of-support date?

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Note: If you receive errors when you run AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI) commands, then see Troubleshooting errors for the AWS CLI. Also, make sure that you're using the most recent AWS CLI version.

AWS will offer ELS for AL2 until June 30, 2026. During the extended support period, AL2 will continue to receive security updates and bug fixes for all packages in the core repository at no additional cost. ELS doesn't require additional configurations for AL2. For more information, see Amazon Linux 2 FAQs.

To get ELS for RHEL, you must purchase an add-on subscription through the AWS Marketplace and configure specific repositories.

Complete the following steps:

1. To verify that your EC2 instance uses the RHEL 7 Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) Amazon Machine Image (AMI), run the describe-instances AWS CLI command to get the billing product code:

   TOKEN=`curl -s -X PUT "http://169.254.169.254/latest/api/token" -H "X-aws-ec2-metadata-token-ttl-seconds: 21600"` && curl -s -H "X-aws-ec2-metadata-token: $TOKEN" http://169.254.169.254/latest/dynamic/instance-identity/document | grep -iE 'BillingProduct|marketplace' | grep billing | awk -F'"' '{print "[ \""$4"\" ]"}'

   Note: In the command's output, bp-6fa54006 means PAYG Hourly. bp-63a5400a means Cloud Access aka BYOS.

2. If your instance isn't running RHEL 7.9, then run the following command to update it:

   sudo yum update -y

3. Open Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 ELS on the AWS Marketplace.

4. Complete the subscription process. Choose Subscribe, and then choose Set up your account to link your AWS account to console.redhat.com. Note: You must have an active Red Hat Customer Portal account for the connection.

5. To use on-demand instances, you must configure hourly metering. You can use the Red Hat host-metering agent. To update subscription-manager and register your system with Red Hat Subscription Management (RHSM), run the following commands:

   sudo yum -y update subscription-manager
   sudo subscription-manager register

6. To Install, activate, and start the host-metering service, run the following commands:

   sudo yum -y install host-metering
   sudo systemctl enable --now host-metering.service
   sudo systemctl status host-metering.service

7. To configure RHSM access to the ELS repositories, run the following command:

   subscription-manager config --rhsm.manage_repos=1

8. To activate the ELS repositories, run the following command:

   subscription-manager repos --enable rhel-7-server-els-rpms

Note: The RHEL ELS add-on provides software maintenance for critical security fixes, important bug fixes that Red Hat selects, and technical support. You can use the ELS add-on only on the previous minor release. For example, for RHEL 7.9, you can use the add-on for RHEL 7.

For information about billing for RHEL ELS, see the RHEL 7 ELS Page topic on Red Hat Enterprise Linux on Amazon EC2 FAQs and Pricing on the AWS Marketplace.

Important: It's a best practice to migrate to the latest supported versions before the ELS period ends. ELS doesn't add new features, enhancements, or non-security packages to your instance. There's also a limited scope for hardware activation and root cause analysis.

Related information

Turning on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Extended Life-cycle Support via cloud marketplaces on the Red Hat website

Announcing up to 4 years of Extended Life Cycle Support (ELS) for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 on the Red Hat website