Ubuntu 20.10 (Groovy Gorilla) has reached its end of life today (July 22, 2021). It was a non-LTS release that introduced some exciting features.
Usually, non-LTS releases are maintained for up to 9 months. So, with 20.10 reaching the end of life means there will be no security and maintenance updates for Ubuntu 20.10 users.
You will also miss out on updates to installed applications, and face issues installing new applications using the apt command. Using the Software Center is going to be a problem as well, without manually modifying sources.list (which is not recommended).
The end of life applies to all other Ubuntu flavors like Kubuntu, Lubuntu, MATE, etc.
While distributions like Linux Mint and elementary OS do not rely on non-LTS releases, you have nothing to worry about there.
It is also a good idea to check your Ubuntu version installed with this command in the terminal:
lsb_release -aUpgrade to Ubuntu 21.04 (Hirsute Hippo): It’s Time!
It is a no-brainer that you need to upgrade to Ubuntu 21.04 to get the latest updates and security improvements.
Ubuntu 21.10 release is only a few months later—so you can try upgrading to it when that is available as well.
For now, you can follow our Ubuntu upgrade tutorial to get started.
I would recommend you to make a backup, in case things go bad with the upgrade process.
If you want to perform a fresh installation, you can do that as well.
Still Using Ubuntu 20.10?
Technically, you can choose to keep using the unsupported version. However, if you do not want security issues to creep up, it is recommended to upgrade to the newest version available i.e Ubuntu 21.04.
Ubuntu 21.04 will be supported until January 2022. You might want to check out the features in Ubuntu 21.04 before making the jump.
How was your experience so far with Ubuntu 20.10? Have you upgraded yet? Let me know in the comments below.
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