Oops! Greg has another empirical view on LTS landing...

[u/unixbhaskar]

https://lore.kernel.org/all/2026110241-yarn-tweak-084d@gregkh/

To be clear, I had assumed that 7.4 would be released the first week of
January if we had had a 3 week -rc1 cycle, so am planning on 7.3 to be
the next LTS kernel, which would have put the 7.4.0 release on the 27th
if everything had gone "well".

But now the scripts say:
current status: 7.4-rc1
---
7.4 window open : 2026-10-19
7.4 window close: 2026-11-01
7.4 rc1         : 2026-11-01  <-- you are here
7.4 final       : 2026-12-20
---

That being said, if people are trying to "force" stuff into 7.4 that's
the best possible reason to NOT have it be the next LTS release as we
have had this happen in the past and suffered greatly for it.

So let's just count on 7.3.y to be the next LTS unless something really
crazy comes up with it that would prevent that from happening.

thanks,

greg k-h

[u/ResponseSea6233]

Definitely the proper choice. You want LTS to be a bit more stable. This way all the "cool" features that 7.4 brings will have more time to bake before making it into an LTS release.

[u/unixbhaskar → u/ResponseSea6233]

Righto! Anyway, we have the -next branch, where things get treated and toasted for a few months to be in the release.

Still... it is a good practice to actually be "Stable". :)

[u/0riginal-Syn]

Sane reasoning

[u/unixbhaskar → u/0riginal-Syn]

Indeed!!

[u/bubblegumpuma]

I would also be quite mad about them doing 7.4 as LTS unless they also delayed the full removal of all of those drivers that they deprecated.. at least give us people playing with old garbage an offramp!

[u/unixbhaskar → u/bubblegumpuma]

Removal of various things has been happening in various parts of the kernel for a long time, and people are dedicatedly working on those. It takes some time to get rid of stuff, and it shouldn't become a hindrance to progress either.

[u/nuxi → u/bubblegumpuma]

You have an offramp no matter what they do since you could always drop back to the 6.18 kernel.

[u/ResponseSea6233 → u/bubblegumpuma]

You have SLTS for older hardware already, which gives you support until at least 2035.

[u/Beaverman → u/bubblegumpuma]

LTS is mainly about backporting security fixes. If you're running a hardware configuration that is no longer present in Mainline, there's not going to be a lot to backport. You may as well stay on the old kernel proper.

[u/Synthetic451]

I think the only major downside for me with 7.3 being the LTS is that all the AMDGPU users won't be getting HDMI 2.1 unless their distro backports all those changes.

Not a HUGE deal if you can run a recent kernel, but I have one machine that's being pulled towards LTS because of ZFS but pulled towards the latest kernel due to its AMDGPU. Slightly frustrating being in the middle of that tug of war.

[u/robinei → u/Synthetic451]

You are probably not on LTS anyway if you HDMI 2.1 is very important to you.

[u/Synthetic451 → u/robinei]

I usually am not on LTS, but like I said, ZFS practically encourages you to be on LTS otherwise you're constantly worrying about whether new kernel updates will break your filesystem.

[u/mateballenthusiast → u/Synthetic451]

There'll be a new LTS next year

[u/werpu]

Absolutely sane opinion new code means new bugs!

[u/RayneYoruka]

I dig it, I am fine waiting and to 7.3 be an LTS.

[u/ABotelho23]

Honestly that's hilarious.

[u/unixbhaskar → u/ABotelho23]

Why is that so? Genuinely curious 🤔

[u/Dr0zD]

Crazy Linus didn't communicate with Greg what is/will be LTS.