Radeon Software For Linux 22.20 supports Ubuntu 22.04 LTS and RHEL 9.0

For Linux users using consumer Radeon Gpus, the frequency of driver updates is nowhere near as high as Windows, with the "Radeon Software for Linux" package stuck in the 22.10 series since late March. For AMD Radeon PRO professional/workstation graphics cards, the official "Radeon PRO Software for Enterprise on Linux" driver is still the 21.q4 version released last December.

Now, however, it seems that AMD is finally ready to release a "22.20" packaged driver as the next functional version of this packaged AMD Linux driver stack for users who don't just rely on upstream kernels and Mesa.

The Radeon Software for Linux package is targeted at enterprise/professional users running enterprise-level Linux distributions such as SUSE, Ubuntu, and RHEL/CentOS. Unless OpenCL/ROCm is required or there is a workload and proprietary Vulkan drivers perform better, gamers and others running cutting-edge Linux distributions are generally better off running only those upstream Linux kernel /Mesa components for optimal support.

It's been a while since the last packaged Radeon Linux driver update, and now 22.20 has been uploaded to the AMD package archive. Although AMD has not officially announced the 22.20 driver, it appears today at repo.radeon.com, and the package's binary installer is available.

Since AMD.com has yet to publish an announcement, the official release notes have not been published to detail all the changes in this new packaged Linux driver release. But most notably, when going through the Radeon repository, there is now an entry for Jammy that has caught the attention of desktop users, meaning Ubuntu 22.04 LTS will now be supported. Ubuntu 22.04 LTS was released back in April, but AMD sat on its hands for about two months, and now as we head into July, it looks like they'll be ready for their official Ubuntu 22.04 support.

Also, the new 22.20 package is the first on RHEL to support Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.0. RHEL 9.0 reached universally available loading in May. On the SUSE side, the recently released SUSE Enterprise Linux 15 SP4 is now also supported.

As a result, at least the enterprise Linux distribution will be supported by the upcoming 22.20 series of packaged Linux drivers, now just waiting for the official release on AMD.com. The 22.20 package can be downloaded from repo.radeon.com prior to the official release.