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Comparison of operating system kernels

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A kernel is a component of a computer operating system.[1] It serves as an intermediary connecting software to hardware, enabling them to work together seamlessly.[2] A comparison of system kernels can provide insight into the design and architectural choices made by the developers of particular operating systems.

Comparison criteria

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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 distributions, 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.

The tables specifically do not include subjective viewpoints on the merits of each kernel or operating system.

Feature overview

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The major contemporary general-purpose kernels are shown in comparison. Only an overview of the technical features is detailed.

Kernel name
Programming
language
 Used in Creator Executable
format
(also see
section
below) 		Type Integrated firewall SMP support Multiple architecture
support
(also see
section below). 		Virtualization Security Profiling/Debugging Soft real-time support Hard real-time support Can keep RTC in UT[3]
Amiga Exec AmigaOS Commodore International HUNK Exokernel (atypical)[4] No No No Yes No No Yes No No No
Amiga Exec SG (2nd Generation) AmigaOS 4 Hyperion Entertainment ELF/HUNK Exokernel (atypical)[5] No No No Yes No No Yes No No ?
DragonFly BSD kernel C DragonFly BSD Matt Dillon ELF hybrid Ipfirewall,
PF 		Yes No Yes chroot, jail, vkernel Unix permissions DDB, KGDB ? ? ?
FreeBSD kernel C FreeBSD,

Debian GNU/kFreeBSD, Gentoo/FreeBSD, Orbis OS

The FreeBSD Project ELF, others - platform dependent monolithic IPFilter, Ipfirewall,
PF 		Yes Yes Yes chroot, jail, bhyve Unix permissions, POSIX.1e and NFSv4 ACLs,[6][7] Capsicum, TrustedBSD MAC, OpenBSM KDB, DDB, KGDB, DTrace, hwpmc Yes ? Yes
GNU Hurd C GNU/Hurd (Arch Hurd, Debian GNU/Hurd) GNU Project/Free Software Foundation ELF multiserver microkernel No Partial[8] No Yes chroot, Xen Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, POSIX Capabilities ? ? ? ?
GNU Mach C part of GNU Hurd, used in GNU/Hurd GNU Project/Free Software Foundation ELF microkernel No Partial[8] No Yes No No ? ? ? ?
Inferno kernel Inferno Bell Labs / Vita Nuova Holdings ? virtual machine ? Yes Yes Yes chroot, Xen ? ? ? ? ?
L4 L4 Jochen Liedtke None microkernel No Yes Yes Yes Yes Afterburner/L4 [1], Marzipan [2], capabilities in L4/Fiasco[9] L4/Fiasco[9] L4/Fiasco[9] ? ?
Linux kernel C Linux (kernel), Android, Ubuntu, CentOS, webOS, Fire OS, Firefox OS, ChromeOS, Syllable Server, Mastodon Linux, OpenBSD/Linux, Plan 9/Linux, Sailfish OS, Tizen, amongst others. Linus Torvalds[10] ELF, others monolithic Yes Yes Yes cgroups, chroot, Lguest, Xen, KVM, kvm-lite, LXC Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, POSIX Capabilities, keyctl, LSM (SELinux, SMACK, TOMOYO Linux, AppArmor) OProfile, kprobe, SystemTap, JProbe, ftrace, KDB, KGDB, kernel marker, perf tools, eBPF preempt=full, threadirqs PREEMPT RT, CPU task isolation[11] Yes
Compute Node Linux Compute Node Linux Cray Inc. ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mach C NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP for Mach, Tru64 UNIX and MkLinux Carnegie Mellon University Mach-O microkernel, hybrid kernel ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? Yes ? ?
MINIX 3 kernel C MINIX 3 Andrew S. Tanenbaum ELF,[12] a.out[13][14] microkernel No No Yes Yes No Unix permissions Call profiling, statistical profiling, Minix Debugger (mdb) No No ?
NetBSD kernel C NetBSD,

GNU/kNetBSD (Debian GNU/NetBSD),

The NetBSD Project ELF, others - platform dependent monolithic, anykernel using rump kernel architecture IPFilter, PF, NPF Yes Yes Yes Xen, chroot kauth, Unix permissions DDB, KGDB, tprof POSIX real-time scheduling extensions Kernel preemption [15] Yes
NetWare kernel NetWare Novell NLM hybrid Yes Yes No Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel C OpenBSD OpenBSD developers ELF, others - platform dependent monolithic PF Yes Yes Yes ? Unix permissions ? ? ? ?
OS/2 kernel OS/2 version 2 and above IBM LX hybrid No Yes No PowerPC version developed but never officially released. Yes No Yes Yes Yes No ?
Plan 9 kernel C Plan 9 from Bell Labs Bell Labs ? monolithic ipmux Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
ReactOS kernel C ReactOS ReactOS Foundation PE hybrid ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ?
Rockbox kernel Rockbox The Rockbox Project ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SunOS kernel C SunOS Sun Microsystems a.out
 monolithic ? Yes Yes Yes ? Unix permissions ? ? ? ?
Solaris kernel C Solaris,

OpenSolaris, GNU/kOpenSolaris (Nexenta OS)

Sun Microsystems ELF (32-bit only until
Solaris 7 in 1998) 		monolithic Yes Yes Yes Zones, chroot Unix permissions, ACL, RBAC, Auditing, Privileges, Zones, Trusted Extensions DTrace, CPU profiling, microstate accounting, perf counters, kernel lock stats, kstats, mdb, kmdb Real-time scheduler ? Yes
SVR5 kernel C UnixWare 7, OpenServer 6 Santa Cruz Operation ELF monolithic IPFilter Yes No Yes No Unix permissions ? ? ? Yes
Trix kernel Trix Massachusetts Institute of Technology a.out monolithic ? Yes No Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
VMkernel C VMware ESXi VMware ELF monolithic Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Unix permissions Built-in debugger ? ? Yes
Windows NT kernel C All Windows NT family systems, 2000,
XP, 2003, Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, Windows Phone 8.1, Windows 10, Windows 11, Windows Server 		Microsoft PE hybrid Yes Yes Yes Yes Hyper-V ACL, Privileges Event Tracing,[16] dgbss, kd Multimedia Class Scheduler Service No Unofficial[17]
Windows 9x kernel C++ Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me Microsoft PE monolithic
XNU (Darwin kernel) C, C++ macOS, iOS, iPadOS, tvOS, watchOS,

OpenDarwin, PureDarwin GNU/Darwin

Apple Inc. Mach-O hybrid Ipfirewall,
PF (starting in Lion) 		Yes Yes Yes chroot Unix permissions, NT/NFSv4 ACLs, TrustedBSD MAC, OpenBSM KDB, DDB, DTrace Yes No Yes
SPARTAN kernel C HelenOS Jakub Jermar ELF microkernel ? Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Zircon C++ Fuchsia OS Google ELF microkernel No Yes Yes Yes Lguest, Xen, KVM, kvm-lite Yes KDB, DDB, GDB Yes No Yes

Failure analysis and availability

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Kernel Name Kernel Log Serious system error report Fatal system error report Kernel crash dump Kernel debugger Hardware error detection Software RAID Remote storage replication
Memory hotplug
 Kernel live patching Kernel live update
DragonFly BSD kernel Yes ? Kernel panic ? ddb ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
FreeBSD kernel kern.msgbuf in sysctl ? Kernel panic Yes[18][a] ddb[18] ? GEOM, ZFS (HAST in user-space) No ? ? ?
Linux kernel kmsg Linux kernel oops Kernel panic / drm_panic kdump[19][b] KDB / KGDB[20] EDAC (formerly Bluesmoke) md, LVM DRBD[21][22] Yes[23] Yes[24] livepatch[25] Kexec HandOver / Live Update Orchestrator[26]
NetBSD kernel Yes ? Kernel panic ? DDB / KGDB ? RAIDframe, ZFS ? ? ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel Yes ? Kernel panic Yes[27] ddb ? softraid ? ? ? ? ?
Solaris kernel Yes ? Yes System core dump[28][c] mdb ereport Solaris Volume Manager, ZFS ? ? ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel NT Kernel Logger in ETW Stop Error (Blue Screen of Death) Kernel-mode Dump KD WHEA Storage Spaces / Disk Management Storage Replica / DFS Replication ? ? Hotpatch[29] ?
XNU Yes ? Kernel panic ? ddb / kdp ? AppleRAID ? ? ? ? ?
Zircon ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
  1. ^ Can be debugged using kgdb(1)
  2. ^ Can be debugged using crash(8)
  3. ^ Can be debugged using mdb(1)

Scalability and clustering

[edit]
Kernel Name Supported number of CPU cores NUMA support Computer cluster interconnect Application checkpointing
/
Process migration 		Single system image Clustered file system
Remote direct memory access (RDMA) support InfiniBand support PCI Express
Non-Transparent Bridge (NTB) support 		CXL 3.1
inter-host communication with GIM support
DragonFly BSD kernel 256[30] Partial[30] ? ? ? ? sys_checkpoint[31] planned[32] HAMMER2
FreeBSD kernel 1024[33] Yes[34] Yes[35] Yes[36] Yes[37] ? ? No pNFS[38]
Linux kernel 8192[39] Yes[40] Yes Yes Yes[41] No Checkpoint/Restart (openMosix) pNFS / Ceph / OCFS2 / GFS2
Solaris kernel 512[42] Yes Yes Yes[43] ? ? No No PxFS
Windows NT kernel ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? No Cluster Shared Volumes

Realtime support

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Kernel Name Full kernel preemption Prevent priority inversion (Priority inheritance) Realtime Scheduling Realtime Priority Realtime I/O CPU Isolation Disable CPU's Interrupt request (IRQ) handling Disable CPU's timer ticks Prevent memory from being swapped out
kernel threads interrupt handlers lock sections kernel space userland
DragonFly BSD kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? mlock/mlockall system call
FreeBSD kernel ? ? ? ? UMUTEX_PRIO_INHERIT on _umtx_op[44] SCHED_FIFO / SCHED_RR on ULE scheduler[45] rtprio system call[45][46] ? ? ? Yes, since FreeBSD 9.0[47] mlock/mlockall system call[48][49]
Linux kernel preempt=full[50] threadirqs PREEMPT_RT[51] RT-mutex / (mutex with Proxy Execution[52]) PI-futexes[53] SCHED_FIFO / SCHED_RR on CFS/EEVDF rtprio system call IOPRIO_CLASS_RT[54] isolcpus[50] irqaffinity nohz_full[55] mlock/mlockall system call
NetBSD kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? mlock/mlockall system call
OpenBSD kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? mlock/mlockall system call
Solaris kernel ? ? ? ? Yes[56] ? ? ? ? ? ? mlock/mlockall system call
Windows NT kernel Yes[57] ? ? AutoBoost[58] ? REALTIME_PRIORITY_CLASS ? ? ? ? Windows 8 and later[59] VirtualLock
XNU ? ? ? ? os_unfair_lock[60] ? ? ? ? ? ? mlock system call
Zircon ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Transport protocol support

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Kernel Name Internet layer (L3) Transport layer (L4) L4S Congestion controls
IPv4 IPv6 IPSec TCP Multipath TCP UDP UDP-Lite SCTP DCCP QUIC Accurate ECN (AccECN) TCP Prague Dual-Queue Coupled Active Queue Management
DragonFly BSD kernel Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes No No No ? ? ? ?
FreeBSD kernel Yes Yes Yes[61] Yes Unofficial patch exists[62] Yes Yes[63] Yes[64] Unofficial patches exist[65][66][67][68] ? ? ? ?
Linux kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes Partial[69] Yes dropped in 7.1[70] Yes dropped in 6.16[71] Unofficial[72] Yes[73][74] (Linux kernel tree with L4S patches) DualPI2 qdisc[75][76]
NetBSD kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes No No No ? ? ? ?
Solaris kernel Yes Yes Yes[77] Yes ? Yes No Yes No ? ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel Yes Yes Yes[78] Yes ? Yes ? No ? ? ? ? ?
XNU Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes No No No ? ? ? ?
Zircon ? ? ? Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ?
[edit]
Kernel Name Data link layer (L2) L2 over L2 L2 segmentation layer 2.5 (L2.5) L2 over L2.5 L2 over L3 L3 over L3 L2 over L4
PPP Ethernet PPPoE IEEE 802.1Q (VLAN) IEEE 802.1ad (QinQ) MPLS VLL Epipe (VPWS) L2TPv3 L2 GRE L3 GRE Mobile IP Minimal Tunneling[79] IP in IP (IPIP)[80] 6in4 (SIT)[81] PPTP L2TP VXLAN
DragonFly BSD kernel Yes[82] Yes ? Yes[83] ? ? ? ? ? Yes[84] gif[85] ? ? ?
FreeBSD kernel Legacy kernel PPP[86][a] and netgraph-based kernel PPP[87] Yes Yes[88] Yes[89] ? ? ? ? ? Yes[90] Yes[91] gif[92] ? ? Yes[93]
Linux kernel Yes[94] Yes[95] Yes[96] Yes[97] Yes[98] ? Yes[99] ? Yes[100] No Yes[101] Yes[102] No[b] Yes[103] Yes[104]
NetBSD kernel Yes[105] Yes Yes[106] Yes[107] ? Yes[108] ? l2tp interface[109] ? Yes[110] gif[111] ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel Yes[112] Yes Yes[113] Yes[114] svlan[114] ? mpw[115] ? egre[116] Yes[116] No ? gif[117] ? ? Yes[118]
Solaris kernel Yes[119] Yes Yes[120] Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? No Yes ? No[b] No[b] Yes
Windows NT kernel ? Yes raspppoe.sys[121] ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes[122] No ipinip.sys[123] No[124] raspptp.sys[125] rasl2tp.sys[125] Yes
XNU Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? No gif ? ? ?
Zircon ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
  1. ^ Dropped since FreeBSD 8.0-RELEASE
  2. ^ a b c Implemented in user-space only

Inter-process communication support

[edit]
Kernel Name Signal Messaging Shared memory Stream-oriented Kernel-assisted Remote Procedure Call
Message queue (Mailbox) between kernel and userspace Anonymous Named Pipe Local socket Pseudo terminal
Anonymous pipe Named pipe
FreeBSD kernel Yes POSIX/System V AF_ROUTE and AF_NETLINK sockets[126][127] SHM_ANON[128] Yes Bidirectional[129] Yes AF_UNIX posix_openpt[130], and UNIX 98 and BSD-style compatibility module[131] ?
XNU Yes POSIX AF_ROUTE and AF_SYSTEM sockets, Mach IPC ? Yes Unidirectional Yes AF_UNIX UNIX 98 and BSD Mach IPC
DragonFly BSD kernel Yes ? ? ? Yes Bidirectional Yes AF_UNIX UNIX 98 and BSD[132] ?
NetBSD kernel Yes ? AF_ROUTE sockets ? Yes Unidirectional Yes AF_UNIX UNIX 98, BSD and OpenBSD (ptm)[133][134] ?
OpenBSD kernel Yes ? AF_ROUTE sockets ? Yes Bidirectional Yes AF_UNIX BSD and OpenBSD (ptm)[135] ?
Linux Yes POSIX/System V AF_NETLINK sockets memfd POSIX/System V Unidirectional Yes AF_UNIX UNIX 98 and BSD Binder
Solaris kernel Yes POSIX/System V ? ? Yes Bidirectional[136] Yes AF_UNIX UNIX 98 and BSD Doors
Windows NT kernel ? MailSlot[137] ? ? Yes Unidirectional NPFS AF_UNIX[138] No ALPC

In-kernel security

[edit]
Kernel
 File access control Disable memory execution support
Kernel ASLR
 Mandatory access control Capability-based security
In-kernel
key management
 Audit API Sandbox SYN flood protection UDP flood protection Ping flood protection Smurf attack protection Network Behavior Analysis
Linux
 Traditional Unix permissions, POSIX ACL Yes Yes LSM (SELinux, SMACK, TOMOYO Linux, AppArmor) Yes keyctl fanotify / inotify SELinux Sandbox, seccomp SYN cookies hashlimit module / intermediate lockless queues[139] ICMP rate limiting reverse path filtering Netfilter
FreeBSD kernel
 Traditional Unix permissions, POSIX and NFSv4 ACL Yes Yes TrustedBSD MAC[140] In-kernel privilege division, and Capsicum ? OpenBSM / inotify[141] Capsicum, MAC framework[142][143] SYN cookies ? ICMP rate limiting ? ?
Solaris kernel
 Traditional Unix permissions, POSIX ACL, NFSv4 ACL Default ? Solaris Trusted Extensions Process privileges[144] ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel
 Access control list DEP Yes Mandatory Integrity Control Process security tokens, and AppContainers No Yes Windows Event Log Yes[145] Yes ? ? ?
XNU
 Traditional Unix permissions, NT/NFSv4 ACL[146] Yes Yes TrustedBSD MAC ? ? OpenBSM Apple XNU Sandbox ? ? ? ? ?
Kernel Code signing Prevent BYOVD attack Runtime integrity checking Application Whitelisting Verifying
Kernel (Secure Boot) Kernel driver Application block device filesystem
Linux Yes Module signature verification[147] IMA / EVM[148] ? (Linux Kernel Runtime Guard[149]) ? dm-verity[150][151] fs-verity[152][153]
FreeBSD kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
NetBSD kernel ? ? ? ? ? veriexec[154] ? ?
Solaris kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel Yes Kernel-Mode Code Signing[155] ? Vulnerable Driver Blocklist[156] PatchGuard[a], HyperGuard[b] AppLocker[154] ? Windows Resource Protection
XNU ? kext signing ? ? Kernel Patch Protection[157] ? ? ?
  1. ^ a.k.a. Kernel Patch Protection
  2. ^ a.k.a. Secure Kernel PatchGuard

In-kernel virtualization

[edit]
Kernel Name Container
(no resource management,
no security) 		Container
(no resource management) 		Container
(resource management) 		Paravirtualization Full virtualization User-space execution Kernel as Library Kernel as Kernel Driver Hypervisor-Enforced Kernel Partitioning
Linux chroot LXC Virtio, Hyper-V (guest only), Xen (guest only), VMI (guest only), kvm-lite, lguest KVM UML (LKL) (coLinux) No
DragonFly BSD kernel chroot jail No No vkernel ? ? No
FreeBSD kernel chroot jail Virtio, Xen[158] bhyve ? ? ? No
NetBSD kernel chroot (sysjail (discontinued)) No Virtio, Xen[159] No ? Rump kernel ? No
OpenBSD kernel chroot No No Xen (guest only)[160] Yes[161] No No No No
Solaris kernel chroot Solaris Containers / Zones No No No ? ? No
Windows NT kernel AppContainers, Job Objects, Windows Server Containers Hyper-V Project Drawbridge No Virtual Secure Mode, Device Guard, Credential Guard[162]
XNU chroot ? ? ? Yes[163] ? ? ? No

In-kernel server support

[edit]
Kernel Name HTTP FTP NFS CIFS Name server Transport-layer load balancer Application-layer load balancer 9P TLS proxy WAF Memcached server
Linux kernel (TUX web server patch) (TUX web server patch) knfsd ksmbd[164][165] ? IP Virtual Server (KTCPVS) (patch available) SOL_TLS[166] (Tempesta FW)[167] (kmemcached)
DragonFly BSD kernel No No Up to NFS v3 Yes ? Yes[168] ? No No ? ?
FreeBSD kernel No No Yes[169][170][171] No No Yes[172] No No ktls[173] ? ?
Solaris kernel ? ? Yes Yes[174] ? Yes[175] Yes[175] ? KSSL ? ?
Windows NT kernel HTTP.sys ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes No ? ? ?
XNU No No Yes No No No No No No ? ?

Binary format support

[edit]

A comparison of OS kernel support for different binary formats (executables):

Name a.out ECOFF ELF FDPIC
ELF
binaries
(mmu less) 		flat
binaries
(superH) 		HUNK Mach-O
Misc
(wrapper based,
like interpreters)
 PE SOM
(PA-RISC,
HP-UX) 		NLM PEF DOS COM MZ LE LX NE
Amiga Exec No No Yes[176] No No Yes No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
DragonFly BSD kernel No No Yes No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
FreeBSD kernel Yes No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No No No No No No
HP-UX kernel No No Yes No No No No No No Yes No No ? ? ? ? ?
Linux Dropped[177][178] Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No Yes ? No ? ? ? ? ?
MINIX 3 Some[13][14] No Yes[12] No No No No No No No No No ? ? ? ? ?
NetBSD kernel Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Dropped[179] ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
ReactOS kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Solaris kernel Yes[180] No Yes[181] No No No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel No No Yes with WSL No No No No No Yes No No No No[a] No[a] ? ? No[a]
XNU No No No No No No Yes No No No No No No No No No No
  1. ^ a b c Supported by Win32 subsystem in user-space on x86

File system support

[edit]

Physical file systems:

Kernel Acorn ADFS Amiga FFS APFS BeFS BFS cramfs EFS ext2 ext3 ext4 F2FS FAT FreeVxFS HFS HFS+ HPFS ISO 9660 JFFS JFFS2 JFS MINIX fs NSS NTFS OCFS QNX4 FS System V FS UDF UFS XFS ZFS ReiserFS Reiser4 Btrfs HAMMER Tux3 exFAT ReFS
DragonFly BSD kernel No No No No No No No Yes No No No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No No limited write No No No read only Yes No No No No No Yes No No No
FreeBSD kernel No No No No No No No Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No No Support dropped since 10.0-RELEASE[182][183] No No No Yes Yes read only Yes read only No No No No ? No
Linux kernel Yes
[184] 		Yes Unofficial
[185] 		read only Yes Yes read only Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes read only Yes limited write (only with empty journal) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Full read/write support since 5.15[186] Yes Yes
[184]
[187] 		write support? Yes Yes
[184] 		Yes 3rd-party module Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No
MINIX 3 kernel No No No No No No No Yes No No No Tools available, cannot mount No No No No Yes No No No Yes No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
NetBSD kernel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
NetWare kernel No No No No No No No No No No No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No No No No No ? No
OpenBSD kernel No No No No No No No Yes No No No Yes No No No No Yes No No No No No Read only No No No Read only Yes No No No No No No No No No
ReactOS kernel No No No No No No No Yes
[188] 		Yes
[188] 		Yes
[188] 		No Yes
[188] 		No No No No Yes
[188] 		No No No No No Read only No No No Yes
[188] 		No No No No No Yes[189][188] No No No No
Solaris kernel ? ? No ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes No No No No No ? No
Windows NT kernel ? ? Unofficial
[185] 		? ? ? ? Unofficial
[190] 		Unofficial
[191] 		Unofficial
[191] 		No Yes ? Unofficial
[185] 		Unofficial
[185] 		No Yes ? ? ? ? No Yes ? ? ? Yes ? ? No No No Unofficial
[192] 		No No Yes Yes
XNU No No Yes No No No No Unofficial
[193] 		Unofficial
[193] 		No No Yes No Yes Yes No Yes No No No No No Read only No No No Yes Yes No Official support was abandoned; 3rd-party modules available No No No No No Yes No

Networked file system support

[edit]
Kernel Name NFS AFS CIFS Coda 9P Ceph
DragonFly BSD kernel Up to NFSv3 No Yes No No No
FreeBSD kernel Yes[171][194] Yes Yes[195] Yes No Yes
Linux kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
NetBSD kernel Up to NFSv3 ? ? ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel Up to NFSv3 ? ? ? ? ?
Solaris kernel Yes Yes Yes No No No
Windows NT kernel Up to NFSv3[196] Yes Yes No No No
XNU Yes Yes Yes No No No

Pseudo file system support

[edit]
Kernel Name Device File System Process File System (procfs) Interface for user-space file systems
DragonFly BSD kernel devfs Yes FUSE
FreeBSD kernel devfs[197] Obsoleted[198] FUSE[199]
Linux devtmpfs Yes FUSE
NetBSD kernel No Yes PUFFS
OpenBSD kernel No No FUSE
Solaris kernel devfs Yes FUSE (3rd-party implementation)
XNU devfs No FUSE (Unofficial implementation)

Supported CPU instruction sets and microarchitectures

[edit]
See also: List of Linux-supported computer architectures
kernel HP Softbank,
ARM Holdings 		Intel MIPS IBM Renesas Electronics Oracle NXP Analog Devices Xilinx Cadence Canon,
Axis Comm. 		Socionext Microchip,
Atmel 		CML,
Hyperstone 		Intel,
Altera 		WDC Sunplus Technology NVIDIA TI
VAX Alpha PA-RISC ARM x86 i960 IA-64 MIPS PowerPC S/390 z/Arch H8300 M16C M32R 78K V850 SuperH SPARC m68k Blackfin (no-mmu) MicroBlaze Xtensa ETRAX CRIS FR-V MN10300 AVR32 E1 (no-mmu) Nios (no-mmu) Nios II WDC 65C816 S+core Tilera C6X
mmu no-mmu 64-bit mmu x86 x86-64 mmu no-mmu 32-bit 64-bit mmu no-mmu 32-bit 64-bit no-mmu mmu no-mmu mmu no-mmu mmu no-mmu
DragonFly BSD kernel No No No No No No No Yes No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
FreeBSD kernel No 6.4 and below only[200] No Yes ? Yes Yes Yes No 10.4 and below only[200] projected to end in 14.x[200] No Yes Yes No No No No No No No No No No 12.x and below only[200] ? No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
Linux kernel No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 6.7 and below only Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 4.16 and below only[201] No 2.6 and below only Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 4.16 and below only[201] Yes Yes Yes 4.16 and below only[201] 4.16 and below only[201] 4.16 and below only[201] 4.12 and below only No No Yes Yes No 4.16 and below only[201] 4.16 and below only[201] Yes
MINIX 3 kernel ? No No Yes ? No Yes In progress No No In progress ? No No No No No ? No ? No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
NetBSD kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes No[202] Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes No[202] Yes No No No ? ? ? ? ? Yes No[202] Yes Yes No[202] Yes No[202] ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
NetWare kernel No No No No No No Yes No ? No No No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? No No No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
OpenBSD kernel last supported release 5.8[203] Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? No Yes ? Yes No No No ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Rockbox kernel ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? No ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Solaris kernel No No No No No No Dropped since Oracle Solaris 11 (11/11)[204] Yes ? No No No Only in Solaris 2.5.1 No No Only available as a separated version of OpenSolaris ? ? ? ? ? No No Dropped since Solaris 10[205] Yes ? No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel No NT 5.0 RC1 and below only No Yes No Yes Yes Yes No XP and 2003-2008 R2 only NT 4.0 and below only No NT 3.51 and NT 4.0 only No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
Windows CE kernel No No No Yes ? ? Yes ? No No Yes ? No No No No No ? No ? No Yes ? No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No
XNU No No No Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? No No No Yes Yes No No ? ? ? ? ? No No No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SPARTAN kernel ? No No Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes No No No ? ? ? ? ? No No Yes Yes ? No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
FreeRTOS kernel ? ? ? ? Yes[206] ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes[206] ? ? No Yes[206] ? ? Yes[206] Yes[206] ? Yes[206] ? ? ? ? ? Yes[206] Yes[206] ? ? ? ? ? Yes[206] ? ? ? Yes[206] ? ? ? ?
VMkernel No No No No No Yes[207] Dropped since VMware ESXi 4.0[208][209] Yes[208] No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No[206] No No No No
Zircon No No No Yes Yes ? No Yes No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No

Supported GPU processors

[edit]
Kernel name Intel NVIDIA AMD Radeon ARM Mali Qualcomm Imagination Technologies Broadcom VeriSilicon Apple
GMA[a] GT[b] Xe[c] GeForce/Quadro/Tesla Xenos/TeraScale GCN/RDNA/CDNA Utgard Midgard/Bifrost Valhall Adreno PowerVR VideoCore4 Vivante[d] AGX
Linux kernel i915 driver xe driver[210] nouveau (C), Nova (Rust)[211] radeon driver amdgpu driver[212] Lima[213][214] Panfrost[214] Panthor (C), Tyr (Rust)[215] msm driver imagination driver[216] vc4 driver[217] etnaviv[218] (Asahi driver)[219]
Windows NT kernel Dropped[e] Yes[222] Yes Dropped[f] Yes No Windows Phone 8.x, Windows 10 Mobile, Windows on ARM Yes[224] No[225] Windows IoT Enterprise on Arm[226] No
XNU Yes (macOS)[227] No[g] No[h] ? No No via I/O Kit (iOS only) No No iOS/macOS
  1. ^ Intel 9xx/Gxx/Qxx
  2. ^ Intel HD Graphics/Iris/UHD Graphics
  3. ^ Iris Xe Graphics/Intel Arc
  4. ^ Used in NXP i.MX family
  5. ^ Intel Graphics Media Accelerator Drivers were supported up to Windows 8.1.[220][221]
  6. ^ AMD drivers for pre-GCN GPUs were supported up to Windows 10.[223]
  7. ^ Quadro & GeForce macOS Driver was supported up to macOS High Sierra (10.13).[228]
  8. ^ Radeon Mac Edition drivers were supported up to Mac OS X 10.4.[229][230][231]

Supported kernel execution environment

[edit]

This table indicates, for each kernel, what operating systems' executable images and device drivers can be run by that kernel.

Kernel name Linux Darwin Windows NT FreeBSD NetBSD Solaris OSF/1 Amiga Unix SunOS BSD/OS iBCS2 systems IRIX Ultrix NDIS SVR4
FreeBSD kernel Yes[232] No No Yes No No No No No No No No No Dropped[233] Dropped[234]
Linux kernel Yes No (Longene) No No No No No No No No No No (NDISwrapper) No
NetBSD kernel Yes[235] Dropped[179] Dropped[236][237] Yes[235] Yes Yes[235] Dropped[238] Yes[235] Yes[235] Yes[235] Dropped[239] Dropped[240] Yes[235] Dropped[241][242] Dropped[243]
OpenBSD kernel Dropped since OpenBSD 6.0[244] No No Dropped since OpenBSD 5.0[245] Dropped since OpenBSD 4.2[246] No No No Dropped since OpenBSD 4.8[247] Dropped since OpenBSD 4.8[247] Dropped since OpenBSD 4.8[247] No Dropped since OpenBSD 4.8[247] No Dropped since OpenBSD 5.0[245]
Windows NT kernel Windows Subsystem for Linux 1 No Yes No No No No No No No No No No Yes No
ReactOS kernel No No Yes No No No No No No No No No No ? No
XNU No Yes No No No No No No No No No No No No No
VMkernel Yes No No No No No No No No No No No No No No

Supported cipher algorithms

[edit]

This may be usable on some situations like file system encrypting.

Kernel name DES AES Blowfish Triple DES Serpent Twofish CAST-128 DES-X IDEA RC2 RC5 SEED Skipjack TEA XTEA CAST-256 RC4 Camellia Anubis KHAZAD Salsa20 FCrypt
DragonFly BSD kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No No Yes No No No Yes Yes No No No No
FreeBSD kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No Yes No No No Yes No No Yes Yes Yes No No No No
Linux Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Windows NT kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No Yes No No No No No No Yes No No No No No
macOS XNU Kernel Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ?

Supported compression algorithms

[edit]

This may be usable on some situations like compression file system.

Kernel name Deflate LZO LZJB zstd
zlib gzip
Linux Yes Yes Yes No Yes
NetBSD kernel Yes Yes Yes ? Yes
Solaris kernel Yes ? ? Yes ?

Supported message digest algorithms

[edit]
Kernel name
CRC-32 (IEEE)
Linux Yes
[248]
[249] 		Yes
[250] 		No Yes
[251] 		Yes
[252] 		Yes
[253] 		Yes
[254] 		Partial
[255] 		Yes
[256] 		Yes
[257] 		Yes
[258] 		Yes
[259] 		Yes
[260] 		Yes
[261] 		Yes
[262] 		Yes
[263] 		Yes
[264] 		No No No Yes
[265]
Solaris kernel Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ?
Windows NT kernel ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? No ? No No No No No No Yes No No No ?
FreeBSD kernel Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ?
XNU kernel Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Supported Bluetooth protocols

[edit]
Kernel name ACL SCO LMP HCI L2CAP BNEP RFComm. SDP TCP AVTCP AVDTP OBEX CMTP HIDP HCRP CAPI PPP
FreeBSD kernel ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? No ? ? ? ? ?
Linux ? Yes[266] ? Yes[266] Yes[266] Yes[266] Yes[266] ? ? ? ? ? Yes[266] Yes[266] ? ? ?
macOS XNU Kernel ? ? ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? No ? ? ? ? ?
Kernel name ACL SCO LMP HCI L2CAP BNEP RFComm. SDP TCP AVTCP AVDTP OBEX CMTP HIDP HCRP CAPI PPP

Audio support

[edit]
Kernel name Audio system in-kernel mixer in-kernel filter
Linux ALSA, with optional OSS API compatibility[267] ? ?
Windows NT kernel MME / WDM audio / Kernel Streaming (KS) Dropped (KMixer.sys) KS Filters
FreeBSD kernel OSS API[268] VCHANs in OSS API[269] ?
NetBSD kernel native (Sun-like) / OSS API[270] audio_system[271] ?
Solaris kernel Sun audio API / OSS API Yes ?

Graphics support

[edit]
Kernel name Framebuffer Display management Hardware Compositing (Multiple Planes) Display Multiplexer Color transform GPU scheduler GPU memory management in-kernel Remote Desktop
Matrices 1D LUT 3D LUT
Linux Linux framebuffer (fbdev) / Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) Kernel Mode Setting (KMS) Plane abstraction in DRM/KMS[272] VGA Switcheroo[273] Linux Color Pipeline API in DRM[274] DRM sched[275] DMA-BUF No
Windows NT kernel Dxgkrnl.sys VidPN Manager in Dxgkrnl.sys[276] Multiplane overlay (MPO) in WDDM[277] ? via MHC profile[278] ? VidSch in Dxgkrnl[279] VidMm in Dxgkrnl.sys, Dxgmms1.sys, and Dxgmms2.sys[280] RdpDD.sys / RdpWD.sys

See also

[edit]

Footnotes

[edit]
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  210. ^ Xe – Merge Acceptance Plan. kernel.org.
  211. ^ Rust-Written NOVA Open-Source NVIDIA Driver Being Further Built Out In Linux 6.17. Phoronix. July 19, 2025
  212. ^ drm/amdgpu AMDgpu driver. kernel.org.
  213. ^ Lima. mesa3d.org.
  214. ^ a b Linux 5.2 DRM Makes Icelake Production-Ready, Adds Lima & Panfrost Drivers. Phoronix. May 9, 2019
  215. ^ Rust-Based Arm GPU Kernel Driver "Tyr" Begins Running GNOME & Basic Games. Phoronix. November 19, 2025
  216. ^ Imagination PowerVR Open-Source GPU Driver To Be Introduced In Linux 6.8. Phoronix. November 23, 2023.
  217. ^ 4.4 Merge window, part 1. LWN. November 11, 2015
  218. ^ 4.5 merge window part 2. LWN. January 20, 2016
  219. ^ DRM User-Space API For Apple Silicon Graphics Posted For Review. Phoronix. March 10, 2025
  220. ^ Intel HD Graphics Drivers and Intel Graphics Media Accelerator Drivers. Intel
  221. ^ Supported Operating Systems for Intel Graphics Products. Intel
  222. ^ List of Drivers for Intel Graphics. Intel
  223. ^ AMD Ends Support For Pre-GCN Graphic Cards – Series HD 7600/8400 and Below Shifted to Legacy Support. Wccftech. November 25, 2015
  224. ^ Intel Atom integrated graphics card for Windows 8 tablet is based on a PowerVR
  225. ^ Raspberry VideoCore 4 support on Windows Microsoft doesn't have plan for OpenGL on UWP also Broadcom doesn't have plan for DirectX
  226. ^ VeriSilicon collaborates with Microsoft to deliver Windows 10 to the Edge. VeriSilicon. March 14, 2023
  227. ^ Intel Graphics Drivers for macOS*. Intel. September 4, 2024
  228. ^ No respite in sight for creative pros trying to get NVIDIA GPUs to work on macOS Mojave. NotebookCheck.net News. December 17, 2018
  229. ^ Radeon X800 XT Mac Edition Drivers and Downloads - Latest Version AMD
  230. ^ Radeon 7000 Mac Edition Drivers and Downloads - Latest Version AMD
  231. ^ Radeon 9000 PRO Mac Edition Drivers and Downloads - Latest Version AMD
  232. ^ Linux emulation in FreeBSD - 2 A look inside...
  233. ^ ndis(4): remove as previous announced. FreeBSD Project. January 25, 2021
  234. ^ Remove SVR4 (System V Release 4) binary compatibility support. FreeBSD Project. February 28, 2017
  235. ^ a b c d e f g NetBSD Binary Emulation
  236. ^ compat_pecoff. The NetBSD Project.
  237. ^ Remove COMPAT_PECOFF from all - I suspect is doesn't build anymore,. The NetBSD Project. November 10, 2007
  238. ^ src/trunk: src Remove compat_osf1, discussed on tech-kern@.. The NetBSD Project.
  239. ^ src/trunk: src Retire compat_ibcs2, as discussed on tech-kern@. FreeBSD did.... The NetBSD Project.
  240. ^ src/trunk: src Remove IRIX emulation. The NetBSD Project.
  241. ^ src/trunk: src Retire NDIS. It appears that it has never worked, after 13 y.... The NetBSD Project.
  242. ^ "Summer of Code:NDIS on NetBSD".
  243. ^ src/trunk: src Remove compat_svr4 and compat_svr4_32, as discussed on tech-.... The NetBSD Project.
  244. ^ "OpenBSD 6.0 Changelog". OpenBSD. Retrieved 2026-01-24.
  245. ^ a b "OpenBSD 5.0 Changelog". OpenBSD. Retrieved 2026-01-23.
  246. ^ "OpenBSD 4.2 Changelog". OpenBSD. Retrieved 2026-01-23.
  247. ^ a b c d "OpenBSD 4.8 Changelog". OpenBSD. Retrieved 2026-01-23.
  248. ^ "Crc32_generic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  249. ^ "Crc32.c « lib - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  250. ^ "Crc32c_generic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  251. ^ "Md4.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  252. ^ "Md5.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  253. ^ "Sha1_generic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  254. ^ "Sha256_generic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  255. ^ "Sha3_generic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  256. ^ "Michael_mic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
  257. ^ "Poly1305_generic.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
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  259. ^ "Rmd160.c « crypto - kernel/Git/Torvalds/Linux.git - Linux kernel source tree".
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  261. ^ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/crypto/rmd320.c [dead link]
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  274. ^ Linux Color Pipeline API. kernel.org.
  275. ^ Deadline Scheduling Policy Being Experimented With For Linux Graphics Drivers. Phoronix. December 30, 2024.
  276. ^ Introduction to Video Present Networks. Microsoft. December 15, 2021.
  277. ^ Multiplane overlay support. Microsoft.
  278. ^ Windows hardware display color calibration pipeline - New GPU color transform pipeline. Microsoft.
  279. ^ WDDM Architecture. Microsoft. October 2, 2024.
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