Just open up a terminal and type in the following: cat /etc/issue. A Linux distribution is an operating system made from a Linux kernel, GNU tools and libraries, and software collections. 4 – Kernel version 2. If you have a Linux distribution with a desktop environment, you can also check your distribution and version from the graphical interface. To find out what version of the Linux kernel is running on your system, type the following command: The hostnamectl command is primarily used for dealing with the hostname but if it provides other details why not use it? Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions. How to check your Linux version: easy ways to view the distribution and version number. Instead of printing all of the above information, you can display the description line, which shows your Debian version passing the -d switch. When you install a Linux distribution on your own, you know which distribution and version it is. Use the following commands to check OpenSSH version running on local or remote systems. Let me explain it to you: 1. I think it is mostly used by Debian/Ubuntu based distributions. Strictly speaking, Linux is a kernel, the core component of the operating system that, simply put, acts just like a bridge between the software applications and the hardware. How would you find when a specific Linux Kernel version is last booted? In this case, the kernel is Linux version 4.16.10-300.fc28.x86_64 running on an x86_64 system. Logged in on a Linux system via SSH and wondering which Linux distribution is it? Comment and share: How to find out what version of an app is installed on Linux By Jack Wallen Jack Wallen is an award-winning writer for TechRepublic, The New Stack, and Linux New Media. You can also use it to know if you are using a 32-bit or 64-bit system.Open a terminal and use the following command:The output will be something similar to this:This means that you are running Linux kernel 4.4.0-97 or in more generic terms, you are running Linux kernel version 4.4.But what do other digits mean here? lsb_release -a No LSB modules are available. Distributions often use it to provide additional information like where to get support or file bugs etc. This file is part of the systemd package and should be present on all system running systemd. For the same CentOS system that you saw above, hostnamectl provides the following details: You can see the Linux version detail in the line starting with 'Operating System'. This command should work on all Linux distributions that have the lsb-release package installed: The Linux distribution and version are shown in the Description line. Run the hostname command to find the Linux distribution name, version, and … You can use the lsb_release command with option -a and it will provide distribution details: Don't mind the No LSB modules are available line. This is a vital question. This command also displays the Linux distribution and kernel version . Now that you know which distribution you are running, perhaps you would also like to know about the Linux kernel version running on the system. If none of the commands above work for you, then most likely, you are running a very old and outdated Linux distribution. If you like our content, please consider buying us a coffee.Thank you for your support! The lsb_release -a command shows the release version, description, and operating system codename. There are a lot of Linux distributions available like Debian, Ubuntu, CentOS, Mint, Arch, Fedora, RHEL, and more. The easiest and simplest way to see the Linux distribution name and the version number is also the one that works on almost every type of Linux. Open a shell prompt (or a terminal) and type the following command to see your current Linux kernel version: $ uname -r When the Terminal icon appears, click on it to open. If that file exists, use the cat command to display the contents. It's not an error of any kind. This is the /etc/os-releasefile. But if you use SSH to log in to a remote Linux server provided by an enterprise or client, you may wonder which Linux distribution and version it is. To know the version of Ubuntu you are running, do a Let's explore different ways to check MySQL version installed on your server. Check OpenSSH version on local system – Use the following command to check OpenSSH version running on local system. The uname command is pulling specs from the kernel running on the host. The simplest way to check Linux version is by using the hostnamectl command without any arguments. Follow the steps below to check Ubuntu version from the command line: Open your terminal either by using the Ctrl+Alt+T keyboard shortcut or by clicking on the terminal icon. Some of the most popular Linux distributions are Debian, Red Hat, Ubuntu, Arch Linux, Fedora, CentOS, Kali Linux, OpenSUSE, Linux Mint, etc. Given a minimal version of a Linux system, how can you know which distribution and which version of the distribution you are working on? For example, the /etc/os-release provides more lines for CentOS Linux. uname is the Linux command to get system information. Open command prompt 2. There are one or two commands to check the Apache web server version in Linux, depending on the Linux distribution you use. Related read: Find out the Linux distribution name, version … However, that's not the only way to know the Linux distribution details. How to See the Pretty Linux Version. The uname command displays several system information, including the Linux kernel architecture, name, version, and release. You might guess how it can be viewed because we covered the use of cat command previously. Its a text file hence cat can be used to read its content. The apachectl command, which available in both Debian and RedHat based Linux distributions have -v option which prints the Apache version: I hope you find this quick tip helpful in finding Linux version detail. This method of discerning your distribution release information has the added bonus of hand… When you install a Linux distribution on your own, you know which distribution and version it is. NAME="CentOS Linux". This is the simplest way to quickly find what version of Kali you're running. No surprise bills, no lock-in, and the same price for every data center. So, you simply do the following … If you want to check the Java version on Ubuntu, Debian or CentOS operating systems, open a command-line terminal and run the following command: java -version. The uname command displays several system information, including the Linux kernel architecture, name, version, and release. $ cat /etc/debian_version 10.1 Checking Debian Version using the /etc/os-release File