Home - News ( United States | United Kingdom | Italy | Germany ) - Football scores

Showing content from https://cloud.google.com/compute/docs/images/os-details below:

Operating system details | Compute Engine

Stay organized with collections Save and categorize content based on your preferences.

This page provides general operating system (OS) details and feature support for the OS images that are available on Compute Engine.

Some OS images are customized specifically to run on Compute Engine and have notable differences from the standard images that come directly from the operating system vendors. These differences are also covered for each OS.

For information about how support and maintenance is provided for these OS images on Compute Engine, based on support package, license type, and image lifecycle stage, see Support and maintenance policy for OS images.

CentOS Linux is a free operating system that is derived from Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Google Cloud builds and supports the CentOS images available for Compute Engine. There is no license fee for using CentOS with Compute Engine.

CentOS Stream is a distribution that is continuously delivered and tracks just ahead of RHEL development. CentOS Stream is positioned as a midstream development platform between Fedora Linux and RHEL.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the dnf-automatic tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• The dnf-automatic tool does not upgrade VMs between major versions of the operating system.
• The upgrade tool is configured to only apply updates marked by the vendor as security updates.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

The CentOS Stream images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard CentOS Stream images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set up as follows:
  • Password authentication is disabled.
  • To prevent SSH disconnections, ServerAliveInterval and ClientAliveInterval are set to 7 minutes.
  • Root login is disabled.
• /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules is disabled.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.
• By default, all traffic is allowed through the guest firewall because the VPC firewall rules overrides the guest firewall rules. The guest firewall rules remains enabled and can be configured through normal CentOS methods.
• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package system and repository configuration

• Google Cloud repositories are enabled to install packages for the Compute Engine guest environment and the Google Cloud CLI.
• Repositories are set to use the CentOS default mirror network.
• Automatic updates are configured as follows:
  • For CentOS Stream, automatic updates are enabled by using dnf automatic.
  • For all versions, the update_cmd property is set to security.However, by default CentOS does not offer security tagged repositories.

Storage configuration

• By default, images are 20 GB. This is the recommended minimum size.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI.
• The floppy module is disabled because there is no floppy disk controller on Compute Engine .

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

^* If a multiple NIC VM is created using this OS image, the VM might lose network connectivity after rebooting. This happens if one of these NICs uses a non-VirtIO interface. For more information, see known issues.

^* This OS image doesn't support Secure Boot on ARM64.
^† Intel TDX isn't supported on ARM64 for this OS image.

^# Only available with certain machine series.
^** This OS image has predictable network interface names disabled. Newer image families may have a different network interface naming scheme.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

Container-Optimized OS from Google is an operating system image for your Compute Engine instances that is optimized for running Docker containers. Google Cloud builds and supports the Container-Optimized OS images available for Compute Engine. There is no license fee for using Container-Optimized OS with Compute Engine.

For more information about Container-Optimized OS, see the Container-Optimized OS overview or release notes.

This operating system can be configured to install security updates by using Automatic updates. On versions 117 and later, automatic updates are disabled by default. On versions 113 and earlier, automatic updates are enabled by default.

The automatic updates have the following behaviors:

• They don't upgrade instances between major versions of the operating system.
• They might require reboots to take effect. These reboots don't happen automatically.

Network configuration

• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

^# Only available with certain machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For G2 VMs, the current default driver for Container-Optimized OS, don't support L4 GPUs running on G2 machine types. You might be able to install a supported version, see G2 limitations.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

Debian is a free operating system offered by the Debian community. Google Cloud builds and supports the Debian images available for Compute Engine. There is no license fee for using Debian with Compute Engine.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the Debian UnattendedUpgrades tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• The UnattendedUpgrades tool does not upgrade VMs between major versions of the operating system.
• The UnattendedUpgrades tool is configured to only automatically apply updates obtained from the Debian security repository.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

The Debian image build configuration is available in an open source GitHub repository.

• Debian build tools come from the Debian Cloud team image project.

Debian images are always built with the latest Debian packages which reflect the most recent Debian point release.

The Debian images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard Debian images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.
• To allow SCSI block multi-queue usage, scsi_mod.use_blk_mq is enabled.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set up as follows:
  • Password authentication is disabled.
  • Root login is disabled.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.
• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package system and repository configuration

• Google Cloud repositories are enabled to install packages for the Compute Engine guest environment and the Google Cloud CLI. The guest environment packages and the Google Cloud CLI packages are installed and enabled by default.
• The APT sources are set to use the Debian CDN.
• The Unattended-upgrades package is installed and configured to download and install Debian security updates daily. This can be configured or disabled by changing the values in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/50unattended-upgrades and /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/02periodic.
• The cloud-initramfs-growroot package is removed and replaced with the Google supported gce-disk-expand package.
• The linux-image-cloud-amd64 kernel is installed instead of the generic Debian kernel.
• The haveged package is installed to provide entropy.

Storage configuration

• Images are 10 GB by default.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI. There is also an MBR boot block to support BIOS.
• The floppy module is disabled because there is no floppy disk controller on Compute Engine.

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

• X86: GA
• Arm: EOS

• X86: August 31, 2026
• Arm: August 15, 2024

^* This OS image supports NVMe but does not include all optimizations for NVMe.

^* You can update the gVNIC driver to the latest version to enable network egress bandwidths of 200 Gbps. For more information, see the Requirements and limitations section of "Configure per VM Tier_1 networking performance".
^† Fully supported with VirtIO, but requires an updated driver to use with gVNIC. For more information, see Jumbo frames.
^# Only available with certain machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

Fedora CoreOS is a distribution that provides features that are needed to run modern infrastructure stacks. Fedora CoreOS uses Linux containers to manage your services at a higher level of abstraction. Google Cloud provides Fedora CoreOS images built and supported by Fedora. There is no license fee for using Fedora CoreOS with Compute Engine.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the FedoraCoreOS automatic update tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• These automatic updates from the operating system vendor do not upgrade instances between major versions of the operating system.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

Network configuration

• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

^*This OS image doesn't support Secure Boot on ARM64.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

Oracle Linux is a Linux operating system (OS) provided by Oracle with everything required to deploy, optimize, and manage applications on-premises, in the cloud, and at the edge.

Oracle builds and supports the Oracle Linux images available for Compute Engine. There is no license fee for using Oracle Linux with Compute Engine. Oracle is responsible for ensuring that Oracle Linux works with Google Cloud features and that security updates are maintained. For issues related to Oracle Linux, you must consult community resources or get enterprise-level support directly from Oracle.

For more information on Oracle Linux visit Oracle's document library for Oracle Linux.

By default, Oracle Linux images don't automatically install security updates. To configure automatic security updates, run the following commands:

   sudo dnf install -y dnf-automatic
   sudo sed -i 's/upgrade_type =.*/upgrade_type = security/' /etc/dnf/automatic.conf
   sudo sed -i 's/apply_updates =.*/apply_updates = yes/' /etc/dnf/automatic.conf
   sudo systemctl enable dnf-automatic.timer
   sudo systemctl start dnf-automatic.timer
   

Automatic updates have the following behaviors:

• dnf-automatic doesn't upgrade VMs between major versions of the operating system.
• The upgrade tool only applies updates marked by Oracle as security updates.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots don't happen automatically.

The Oracle Linux images that are provided by Compute Engine reflect the most recent point release. Currently you cannot pin a VM to a point release. These images have the following differences in configuration from standard Oracle Linux images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.
• The I/O scheduler is set to noop.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set up as follows:
  • Password authentication is disabled.
  • To prevent SSH disconnections, ServerAliveIntervaland ClientAliveInterval are set to 7 minutes.
  • Root login is disabled.
• /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules is disabled.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.
• By default, all traffic is allowed through the guest firewall because the VPC firewall rules overrides the guest firewall rules. The guest firewall rules remains enabled and can be configured through normal Oracle Linux methods.
• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package system and repository configuration

• The Google Cloud repository is enabled to install packages for the Compute Engine guest environment and disabled for the Google Cloud CLI. The Google Cloud CLI can be installed as follows: dnf install -y google-cloud-cli --enablerepo google-cloud-sdk
• Automatic security updates are disabled by default. To enable, refer to the instructions in the Automatic updates section.

Storage configuration

• By default, images are 20 GB. This is the recommended minimum size.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI.

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

Oracle Linux images use the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) by default. The interface support listed in the table applies to images that use the UEK. You can optionally configure Oracle Linux images to use the Red Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK), which is additionally installed on Oracle Linux images. If you use the RHCK, Oracle Linux images support the same interfaces as the corresponding Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) listed in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) section of this document.

gcloud CLI is not pre-installed in the images, however the Google Cloud SDK repository is setup. To install gcloud CLI you can run this command: dnf install -y google-cloud-cli --enablerepo google-cloud-sdk

Oracle Linux images use the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) by default. The networking features support listed in the table applies to images that use the UEK. You can optionally configure Oracle Linux images to use the Red Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK), which is additionally installed on Oracle Linux images. If you use the RHCK, Oracle Linux images support the same networking features as the corresponding Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) listed in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) section of this document.

^# Only available with certain machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

Oracle Linux images use the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) by default. The GPU support listed in the table applies to images that use the UEK. You can optionally configure Oracle Linux images to use the Red Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK), which is additionally installed on Oracle Linux images. If you use the RHCK, Oracle Linux images support the same GPUs as the corresponding Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) listed in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) section of this document.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is an open-source Linux operating system that provides both server and desktop operating systems. Google Cloud builds and supports the RHEL OS images available for Compute Engine.

RHEL images are premium resources that incur additional fees to use. If you want to use an existing RHEL subscription, you can use the Red Hat Cloud Access feature.

The Red Hat Knowledgebase provides you with access to articles, solutions, product documentation, and community discussions. The Red Hat Knowledgebase is available as a single-sign-on (SSO) option through the Google Cloud console. See Access Red Hat Knowledgebase.

To view a list of frequently asked questions when running RHEL on Compute Engine, see Red Hat Enterprise Linux FAQ.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the RHEL yum-cron (RHEL 7) or dnf automatic (RHEL 8+) tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• These automatic updates from the operating system vendor do not upgrade instances between major versions of the operating system.
• Starting with RHEL 7, the operating system is also configured to only apply updates marked by the vendor as security updates.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

The RHEL image build configuration is available in an open source GitHub repository.

RHEL images are always built with the latest RHEL packages, which reflect the most recent point release. Currently, you cannot pin a VM to a point release.

RHEL for SAP images are tagged to the specific point release they are built for as supported by Red Hat.

The RHEL images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard RHEL images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.
• The I/O scheduler is set to noop.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set up as follows:
  • Password authentication is disabled.
  • To prevent SSH disconnections, ServerAliveInterval and ClientAliveInterval are set to 7 minutes.
  • Root login is disabled.
• /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules is disabled.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.
• By default, all traffic is allowed through the guest firewall because the VPC firewall rules overrides the guest firewall rules. The guest firewall rules remains enabled and can be configured through normal RHEL methods.
• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package and repository configuration

• Google Cloud repositories are enabled to install packages for the Compute Engine guest environment and the Google Cloud CLI.
• RHEL for SAP yum vars are set to peg the client to the supported RHEL for SAP point release.
• RHEL content comes from the Compute Engine Red Hat Update Infrastructure (RHUI) servers. If you're unable to get updates from the Red Hat Update Infrastructure (RHUI) servers, the RHUI client package might need to be updated. To update to the latest RHUI client package, run the following command:

    dnf -y -q update 'google-rhui-client*'
  

• The Google RHUI client package, which contains the configuration needed to access RHEL content, is installed.
• The Red Hat subscription-manager package is removed because it is not used for pay as you go images.
• Automatic updates are enabled as follows:
  • For RHEL 8+, by using dnf automatic.
  • For all versions, the update_cmd property is set to security.

Storage configuration

• By default, images are 20 GB. This is the recommended minimum size.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI.

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

^*EOS: End of support.

^†ELS: To use this OS image, you must have a subscription or an Extended Life Cycle Support (ELS) Add-On. You can append the ELS Add-On to your RHEL 6 VMs as described in Append RHEL ELS licenses.

^*This OS image supports NVMe but does not include all optimizations for NVMe.

^#If a multiple NIC VM is created using this OS image, the VM might lose network connectivity after rebooting. This happens if one of these NICs uses a non-VirtIO interface. See known issues.

^* This OS image doesn't support Secure Boot on ARM64.
^† Intel TDX isn't supported on ARM64 for this OS image.

^*You can update the gVNIC driver to the latest version to enable network egress bandwidths of 200 Gbps. For more information, see the Requirements and limitations section of "Configure per VM Tier_1 networking performance".

^†Fully supported with VirtIO, but requires an updated driver to use with gVNIC. For more information, see Jumbo frames.

^#Only available with certain machine series.

^**This OS image has predictable network interface names disabled. Newer image families may have a different network interface naming scheme.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-10-server
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-10-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-server
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-server
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• ELS^†


• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-7-server
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-7-els
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-7-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• ELS^†
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-6-server
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-6-els
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-6-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-9-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-8-sap-byos

• On-demand
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rhel-sap-cloud/global/licenses/rhel-7-sap
• N/A

^†ELS: To use this OS image, you must have a subscription or an Extended Life Cycle Support (ELS) Add-On. You can append the ELS Add-On to your RHEL 6 VMs as described in Append RHEL ELS licenses.

Rocky Linux is a free, open, community enterprise operating system designed to be 100% bug-for-bug compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Google Cloud builds and supports the Rocky Linux images available for Compute Engine. There is no license fee for using Rocky Linux with Compute Engine.

The following three versions of Rocky Linux operating systems are available on Compute Engine:

• A fully open source version
• A version optimized for Google Cloud: this version has the suffix -optimized-gcp and is pre-configured to use the latest version of the Google virtual network interface (gVNIC).
• An accelerated version for GPU workloads: this version has the suffix -optimized-gcp-nvidia-* which is built off of the -optimized-gcp version and includes the indicated version of the NVIDIA driver.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the dnf-automatic tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• dnf-automatic does not upgrade VMs between major versions of the operating system.
• The upgrade tool is configured to only apply updates marked by the vendor as security updates.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

Rocky Linux images are built and maintained by CIQ. Rocky Linux images are always built with the latest Rocky Linux packages which reflect the most recent Rocky Linux point release. The Rocky Linux images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard Rocky Linux images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set up as follows:
  • Password authentication is disabled.
  • To prevent SSH disconnections, ServerAliveIntervaland ClientAliveInterval are set to 7 minutes.
  • Root login is disabled.
• /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules is disabled.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.
• By default, all traffic is allowed through the guest firewall because the VPC firewall rules overrides the guest firewall rules. The guest firewall rules remains enabled and can be configured through normal Rocky Linux methods.
• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package system and repository configuration

• Google Cloud repositories are enabled to install packages for the Compute Engine guest environment and the Google Cloud CLI.
• For the Google Cloud optimized and accelerated versions of the Rocky Linux images, the GitLab CIQ SIG/Cloud Next repository is enabled. This repository provides a Linux kernel version specifically designed to work best with Google Cloud hardware.
• For the accelerated version of the Rocky Linux image, the GitLab CIQ SIG/Cloud Next Nonfree repository is also enabled. This repository provides the proprietary drivers necessary for the system to fully utilize the GPU hardware.
• Repositories are set to use the Rocky Linux default mirror network.
  • The PowerTools repository is enabled.
• Automatic updates are configured as follows:
  • Automatic updates are enabled by using dnf automatic.
  • For all versions, the update_cmd property is set to security. However, by default Rocky Linux does not offer security tagged repositories.

Storage configuration

• By default, images are 20 GB.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI.
• The floppy module is disabled because there is no floppy disk controller on Compute Engine .

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

^* Intel TDX isn't supported on ARM64 for this OS image.

^# Only available with certain machine series.
^** This OS image has predictable network interface names disabled. Newer image families may have a different network interface naming scheme.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

The Rocky Linux 8 and 9 Accelerated OS images are optimized for supporting your artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) workloads. To learn more about how these images are optimized for these workloads, see Operating systems in the AI Hypercomputer documentation.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

For version tracking, Rocky Linux accelerated images include three licenses:

• A license for the base Rocky Linux optimized OS.
• A license to designate the image as an accelerated image.
• A license for the NVIDIA driver.

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-9-optimized-gcp
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-9-accelerated
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/nvidia-580

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-9-optimized-gcp
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-9-accelerated
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/nvidia-570

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-9-optimized-gcp
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-9-accelerated
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/nvidia-550

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-8-optimized-gcp
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-8-accelerated
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/nvidia-580

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-8-optimized-gcp
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-8-accelerated
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/nvidia-570

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-8-optimized-gcp
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/rocky-linux-8-accelerated
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/rocky-linux-accelerator-cloud/global/licenses/nvidia-550

Microsoft SQL Server can be used on Linux-based VMs or images with an on-demand license. Google does not provide pre-configured images for SQL Server on Linux.

Microsoft SQL Server images are not supported for VMs created on the C4A machine series and the T2A machine series.

To use on-demand / pay-as-you-go (PAYG) licenses for Microsoft SQL Server on a Linux VM or image, see Add a SQL Server license to an existing Linux server.

Microsoft SQL Server images are similar to the standard Windows Server operating system images, but they include Microsoft SQL Server preinstalled.

Microsoft SQL Server images are not supported for VMs created on the C4A machine series and the T2A machine series. Using a Microsoft SQL Server Windows image with a bare metal instance isn't supported.

By default, this operating system is configured to "Auto download and schedule the install" for Microsoft updates. To configure Windows Server automatic updates, see Configure Automatic Updates.

• Microsoft SQL Server images have the same Notable differences as standard Windows Server images.
• Windows images provided by Google have a hardcoded MTU. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

To use Microsoft SQL Server on a Windows VM with an on-demand / pay-as-you-go (PAYG) license, see Add a SQL Server license to an existing Windows server.

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES), a versatile server operating system for deploying highly available enterprise-class IT services in mixed IT environments with improved performance and reduced risk.

SUSE builds and supports the SUSE images available for Compute Engine. SUSE images are premium resources that incur additional fees to use.

To view a list of frequently asked questions when running SLES on Compute Engine, see SUSE Linux Enterprise Server FAQ.

This operating system is not configured to install updates by default. For more information about configuring automatic updates for SLES, see SUSE documentation.

SLES and SLES for SAP images are built and maintained by SUSE. SLES images are built with the latest SLES packages reflected in their release.

The SUSE images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard SUSE images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set to disable password authentication.
• SLES does not use predictive network interface naming. In the grub kernel command-line arguments, net.ifnames=0 is set. Therefore, network interfaces use the traditional ethN naming, with the default interface always being eth0.
• VMs based on Google-provided Linux images get their interface MTU from the attached VPC MTU. VMs based on custom images or older Linux images may have their MTU's hardcoded. In these cases, you have to change the setting yourself if you want to connect the interface to a network with an MTU other than 1460. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package system and repository configuration

• The guest environment for Compute Engine packages are installed from the packages that are supplied by SUSE.
• SLES instances register with a SUSE run SMT service for Compute Engine and are configured to use SUSE regional mirrors in Compute Engine.

Storage configuration

• Images are 10 GB by default.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI. There is also an MBR boot block to support BIOS.
• The floppy module is disabled because there is no floppy disk controller on Compute Engine.

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

^* This OS image doesn't support Secure Boot on ARM64.
^† Intel TDX isn't supported on ARM64 for this OS image.

^*This OS image doesn't support custom hostnames. For more information see Custom Hostnames.

^*You can update the gVNIC driver to the latest version to enable network egress bandwidths of 200 Gbps. For more information, see the Requirements and limitations section of "Configure per VM Tier_1 networking performance".

^†Fully supported with VirtIO, but requires an updated driver to use with gVNIC. For more information, see Jumbo frames.

^#Only available with certain machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

For version tracking, Rocky Linux accelerated images include three licenses:

• A license for the base Rocky Linux optimized OS.
• A license to designate the image as an accelerated image.
• A license for the NVIDIA driver.

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-cloud/global/licenses/sles-12
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-12-byos

• EOS

• N/A

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-15-byos

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOS

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-sap-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-12
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/suse-byos-cloud/global/licenses/sles-sap-12-byos

• EOS

• N/A

^*BYOS with LTSS: Support for this operating system is only offered through the Long Term Service Pack Support (LTSS) that is available when using BYOS licenses from SUSE.

Ubuntu is a free operating system developed and supported by Canonical.

Ubuntu Long Term Support (LTS) images receive bug fixes and security updates for five years after their release date. LTS images can run on your instances for several years without having to upgrade to a newer release.

Ubuntu Minimal images are supported the same as Ubuntu LTS images.

Regular (non LTS) Ubuntu images are supported for 9 months from their release date. To continue to use a regular Ubuntu image, you will have to upgrade to the next regular Ubuntu release or LTS release after the support cycle ends to receive fixes and updates. Compute Engine recommends using Ubuntu LTS images unless you require features or software packages that are not yet included in an LTS release. If your instances run Ubuntu releases that are no longer supported, upgrade to a supported Ubuntu release.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the Ubuntu AutomaticSecurityUpdates tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• The AutomaticSecurityUpdates tool does not upgrade VMs between major versions of the operating system.
• The AutomaticSecurityUpdates tool is configured to only automatically apply updates obtained from the Ubuntu security repository.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

Ubuntu images are built and maintained by Canonical. Ubuntu images are always built with the latest Ubuntu packages which reflect the most recent Ubuntu point release.

The Ubuntu images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard Ubuntu images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• Ubuntu uses cloud-init to do some boot time initialization. The cloud.cfg file is configured for Compute Engine and enables only the cloud-init modules that are used.
• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.
• To allow SCSI block multi-queue usage, scsi_mod.use_blk_mq is enabled.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set to disable password authentication.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.

Package system and repository configuration

• The guest environment for Compute Engine packages are installed from the Ubuntu supplied packages.
• For Ubuntu 18.04+, the Google Cloud CLI is installed and maintained as a snap package.
• The APT sources are set to use the Ubuntu Compute Engine mirrors via cloud-init.
• The Unattended-upgrades package is installed and configured to download and install Debian security updates daily. This can be configured or disabled by changing the values in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/50unattended-upgrades and /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/02periodic.
• The linux-image-gcp kernel is used instead of the generic Ubuntu kernel. The Google Cloud kernel reflects the latest rolling HWE kernel for Ubuntu LTS.

Storage configuration

• Images are 10 GB by default.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI. There is also an MBR boot block to support BIOS.
• The floppy module is disabled because there is no floppy disk controller on Compute Engine.

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

For information about non LTS Ubuntu releases, see the Ubuntu release wiki.

^* Ubuntu ESM: You can apply your existing ESM subscription to the Google provided OS image. The image that is provided by Google Cloud contains enhancements that might not be included if you bring your own OS image.
^† Ubuntu Pro: To continue using Ubuntu 16.04 and 18.04 LTS images, upgrade from Ubuntu to Ubuntu Pro.

^* Intel TDX isn't supported on ARM64 for this OS image.

^* This OS image doesn't support custom hostnames. For more information, see Custom Hostnames.

^* You can update the gVNIC driver to the latest version to enable network egress bandwidths of 200 Gbps. For more information, see the Requirements and limitations section of "Configure per VM Tier_1 networking performance".
^† Fully supported with VirtIO, but requires an updated driver to use with gVNIC. For more information, see Jumbo frames.
^# Only available with certain machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

The Ubuntu 22.04 and 24.04 LTS Accelerated OS images are optimized for supporting your artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) workloads. To learn more about how these images are optimized for these workloads, see Accelerator OS images in the AI Hypercomputer documentation.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

For version tracking, Rocky Linux accelerated images include three licenses:

• A license for the base Rocky Linux optimized OS.
• A license to designate the image as an accelerated image.
• A license for the NVIDIA driver.

^* Ubuntu ESM: You can apply your existing ESM subscription to the Google provided OS image. The image that is provided by Google Cloud contains enhancements that might not be included if you bring your own OS image.
^† Ubuntu Pro: To continue using Ubuntu 16.04 and 18.04 LTS images, you must upgrade from Ubuntu to Ubuntu Pro.

Ubuntu Pro is a premium operating system developed and supported by Canonical.

Ubuntu Pro images running on Compute Engine receive bug fixes and security updates for 10 years after their release date, along with access to Ubuntu ESM. For Ubuntu 16.04, security updates and ESM are available for 8 years.

Ubuntu Pro images are premium resources that incur additional fees to use. For information about Ubuntu Pro license cost, see the Ubuntu Pro pricing page. An Ubuntu Pro image running on Compute Engine has an on-demand license and does not require an additional Ubuntu Pro subscription.

To view a list of frequently asked questions when running Ubuntu Pro on Compute Engine, see Ubuntu Pro FAQ.

By default, this operating system is configured to install security updates by using the Ubuntu AutomaticSecurityUpdates tool. The updates have the following behaviors:

• The AutomaticSecurityUpdates tool does not upgrade VMs between major versions of the operating system.
• The AutomaticSecurityUpdates tool is configured to only automatically apply updates obtained from the Ubuntu security repository.
• Some updates require reboots to take effect. These reboots do not happen automatically.

Ubuntu Pro images are built and maintained by Canonical. Ubuntu Pro images are always built with the latest Ubuntu packages which reflect the most recent Ubuntu point release.

The Ubuntu Pro images that are provided by Compute Engine, have the following differences in configuration from standard Ubuntu images:

Account configuration

• There are no local users configured with passwords.

Bootloader configuration

• Ubuntu uses cloud-init to do some boot time initialization. The cloud.cfg file is configured for Compute Engine and enables only the cloud-init modules that are used.
• To force faster boot times, the boot timeout in the grub configuration is set to 0.
• To allow SCSI block multi-queue usage, scsi_mod.use_blk_mq is enabled.

Network configuration

• IPv6 is enabled.
• The SSH server configuration is set to disable password authentication.
• To prevent MAC addresses from persisting, /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is removed.

Package system and repository configuration

• The guest environment for Compute Engine packages are installed from the Ubuntu supplied packages.
• The Google Cloud CLI is installed and maintained as a snap package.
• The APT sources are set to use the Ubuntu Compute Engine mirrors via cloud-init.
• The Unattended-upgrades package is installed and configured to download and install Debian security updates daily. This can be configured or disabled by changing the values in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/50unattended-upgrades and /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/02periodic.
• The linux-image-gcp kernel is used instead of the generic Ubuntu kernel. The Google Cloud kernel reflects the latest rolling HWE kernel for Ubuntu LTS.

Storage configuration

• Images are 10 GB by default.
• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI. There is also an MBR boot block to support BIOS.
• Ubuntu uses cloud-init to do some boot time initialization. The cloud.cfg file is configured for Compute Engine and enables only the cloud-init modules that are used.
• There are no local users configured with passwords.
• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.
• The floppy module is disabled because there is no floppy disk controller on Compute Engine.

Time configuration

• The NTP server is set to use the Compute Engine metadata server.

For information about upgrading from Ubuntu LTS to Ubuntu Pro, see Upgrade from Ubuntu to Ubuntu Pro.

^*This OS image supports NVMe but doesn't support the hot-plugging of NVMe drives. Hot-plugging is the process of adding or removing a device while the system is running.

^* Intel TDX isn't supported on ARM64 for this OS image.

^* This OS image doesn't support custom hostnames. For more information, see Custom Hostnames.

^* You can update the gVNIC driver to the latest version to enable network egress bandwidths of 200 Gbps. For more information, see the Requirements and limitations section of "Configure per VM Tier_1 networking performance".
^† Fully supported with VirtIO, but requires an updated driver to use with gVNIC. For more information, see Jumbo frames.
^# Only available with certain machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

For version tracking, Rocky Linux accelerated images include three licenses:

• A license for the base Rocky Linux optimized OS.
• A license to designate the image as an accelerated image.
• A license for the NVIDIA driver.

Google doesn't provide Windows client images. You must bring your own Windows client images.

Windows client images can't be used with bare metal instances. Also, Windows client images aren't supported for C4A machine series and T2A machine series VMs.

The Windows client update settings determine how versions of Windows client use Windows Updates. To configure Windows automatic updates, see Configure Automatic Updates.

Google doesn't test the VSS agent on any client images.

^*Lifecycle stage: Google Cloud Support typically coincides with Extended Support End Date. For information about the end of support (EOS) date for each of the operating systems in the table below, see the Microsoft Lifecycle Policy.

^**Windows 11: vTPM and Secure Boot must be enabled. Due to CPU requirements, N1 and M1 sole-tenant node types are not recommended.

^**Windows 11: vTPM and Secure Boot must be enabled. Due to CPU requirements, N1 and M1 sole-tenant node types are not recommended.

^*Guest environment: For this OS, the guest environment can be manually installed. To install the guest environment, see Install the guest environment.

^†gcloud CLI: For this OS, the gcloud CLI can be manually installed. To install the gcloud CLI, see Install the gcloud CLI.

^‡Suspend and resume: For this OS, some power policy configurations are incompatible with suspend and resume. For more information, see troubleshooting VM suspension.

^{^}Suspend and resume: Suspend and resume for Windows 11 24h2 x64 isn't supported. This is a known issue and a fix is in progress.

^*Only available with supported machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

^*For this Windows client version, NVIDIA V100 GPUs are not supported.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

For version tracking, Rocky Linux accelerated images include three licenses:

• A license for the base Rocky Linux optimized OS.
• A license to designate the image as an accelerated image.
• A license for the NVIDIA driver.

Windows Server images are premium resources that incur additional fees to use. Google Cloud builds and supports the Windows Server images available for Compute Engine.

Windows server images can't be used with bare metal instances.

To bring your own Windows license (BYOL), you must either import an existing image, or you must build a custom image.

By default, this operating system is configured to "Auto download and schedule the install" for Microsoft updates. To configure Windows Server automatic updates, see Configure Automatic Updates.

Windows Server images are built with the latest updates, but have the following differences in configuration from standard Windows Server images:

Account configuration

• The Administrator account is disabled.
• User passwords must be at least eight characters long.
• The LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy property is enabled to grant access to administrative file shares.

Activation configuration

• Windows Server images can't activate without a network connection to kms.windows.googlecloud.com, and stop functioning if they don't authenticate within 30 days. Make sure to [allow access in your VPC network](/compute/docs/instances/windows/creating-managing-windows-instances#kms-server).
• A KMS client key is installed and the KMS client is set to activate by using the Compute Engine KMS servers.

Bootloader configuration

• BootStatusPolicy is set to IgnoreAllFailures.
• Emergency Management Services (EMS) redirection is enabled on the COM2 port. For more information, see bootcfg ems.

Network configuration

• The Compute Engine metadata server is added to the hosts file, which is typically in the %WinDir%\System32\drivers\etc directory.
• The Windows firewall is open to allow communication with the Compute Engine metadata server.
• TCP KeepAliveTime is set to 5 minutes.
• Web Proxy Auto Discovery (WPAD) is disabled.
• The NetKVM adapter is set to use DHCP.
• Remote Desktop (RDP) is enabled and the associated Windows firewall ports opened.
• WinRM over HTTPS is configured using a self signed certificate and the associated Windows firewall ports are open.
• Windows images provided by Google have a hardcoded MTU. For more information about network and interface MTU, see the maximum transmission unit overview.

Package system and Windows Update

• Windows Server images update automatically according to the default update schedule for Windows Server.
• To install packages for the guest environment, Google Cloud repositories are enabled.
• To manage Compute Engine component packages for Windows, GooGet is installed, which you can configure to update packages automatically.
• The Google Cloud CLI is installed with its own Python 2.7 environment. Google Cloud CLI works with project service accounts, instance scopes, and works in PowerShell and the standard command-line environment.
• To boot Windows on Compute Engine, Compute Engine drivers are installed.
• PowerShell v5 and v7 are installed.

Power configuration

• Power settings are changed to never turn off the monitor.

Storage configuration

• The partition table is GPT, and there is an EFI partition to support booting on UEFI.
• The paging file is set to a static size of 1 GB.
• The EnableQueryAccessAlignment property is enabled for the VioSCSI driver.

Time configuration

• The RealTimeIsUniversal registry key is set. The BIOS is a UTC clock, and is not set to the local time.
• The time zone is set to UTC (Coordinated Universal Time).
• NTP is set to sync to the Compute Engine metadata server.

^*Lifecycle stage: Google Cloud Support typically coincides with Extended Support End Date. For information about the end of support (EOS) date for each of the operating systems in the previous table, see the Microsoft Lifecycle Policy.

^*Only available with supported machine series.

N1+GPU denotes support for NVIDIA T4, V100, P100, or P4 GPUs running on a general-purpose N1 machine family.

For more information about GPU requirements and recommended OSes, see choosing an OS for instances with attached GPUs.

^*For this Windows client version, NVIDIA V100 GPUs are not supported.

For operating system support information on migrating VMs using Migrate to Virtual Machines, see supported operating systems.

^*Self-import is available.

For version tracking, Rocky Linux accelerated images include three licenses:

• A license for the base Rocky Linux optimized OS.
• A license to designate the image as an accelerated image.
• A license for the NVIDIA driver.

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOL¹

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2025-dc
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2025-byol

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOL¹

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2022-dc
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2022-byol

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOL¹

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2019-dc
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2019-byol

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOL¹

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2016-dc
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2016-byol

• On-demand (Default)
• BYOL¹

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2012-r2-dc
• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2012-r2-byol

• BYOL¹

• https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/windows-cloud/global/licenses/windows-server-2012-byol

See the notes on Bring Your Own License (BYOL) for Microsoft Licensing.

Except as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License. For details, see the Google Developers Site Policies. Java is a registered trademark of Oracle and/or its affiliates.

Last updated 2025-10-13 UTC.

[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Hard to understand","hardToUnderstand","thumb-down"],["Incorrect information or sample code","incorrectInformationOrSampleCode","thumb-down"],["Missing the information/samples I need","missingTheInformationSamplesINeed","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-10-13 UTC."],[],[]]

RetroSearch is an open source project built by @garambo | Open a GitHub Issue

Search and Browse the WWW like it's 1997 | Search results from DuckDuckGo

HTML: 3.2 | Encoding: UTF-8 | Version: 0.7.5