It remains the oldest Linux distribution that is still actively maintained. Marc Ewing released the first version of Red Hat Linux in 1994 and joined Bob Young to form Red Hat Software the following year. CentOS Stream sits between Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux as the continuously delivered development stream for upcoming RHEL work. In December 2020, Red Hat announced that CentOS Linux 8 would end in December 2021 and that the project would concentrate on CentOS Stream instead. CentOS Linux 7 continued until June 2024, but the announcement placed the traditional downstream rebuild model on a path to disappear.