You have probably heard Windows users around the globe bemoaning the fact that their operating system of choice will soon no longer be supported. There are ways to extend that support, but they can be complicated and/or costly.
If you think the same thing holds true for aging Ubuntu installations, think again. Unlike Windows, extending the support for Ubuntu 20.04 is actually quite simple, thanks to a service called Ubuntu Pro.
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Before you think it, home users can do this for free, thanks to Extended Support Maintenance (ESM). With ESM, you get 10 total years of vulnerability management for critical, high, and (some) medium security issues for every piece of software that ships with Ubuntu. That 10 years means that, with Ubuntu 20.04, you would still have 5 years left (since 20.04 was released in 2020).
Of course, a simple question comes to mind: Why are you using a release of Ubuntu that is five years old? It might be running perfectly, and you either do not have the time or inclination to upgrade.
Before I continue, I will say this: You should upgrade. I have run countless Ubuntu upgrades over the years and have never had an issue. So, if you are using Ubuntu on a desktop, I would highly recommend you stay up to date with the latest releases, or at least migrate from Long Term Support (LTS) release to LTS release (such as 20.04 to 22.04 to 24.04).
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What is really surprising about the ESM feature is that it is free for personal usage. That is right — if you use Ubuntu only for yourself, you can attach a desktop machine to your Ubuntu Pro account, and it will enjoy vulnerability updates for 10 years.
But how do you do it? It is actually quite simple.
Sign up for a Ubuntu Pro account
The first thing you must do is sign up for a Ubuntu Pro account.
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To do that, head over to the official Ubuntu Pro site and create a new account (remember, it is free). Once you have created your new account, you are ready to connect your aging operating system to ESM.
Add ESM to Ubuntu
While on your Ubuntu Pro account, click on Your Subscriptions.
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In that tab, you will see a token that is specific to your account and the command required to attach a machine. The command will be in the form sudo pro attach TOKEN (where TOKEN is the token assigned to your account).
You should find your token and the necessary command here.
Jack Wallen/ZDNET
Once you run the command, you will see the following:
Subscription: Ubuntu Pro — free personal subscription
When you see that, your Ubuntu 20.04 machine is now covered for vulnerabilities until 2030.
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Keep in mind that ESM is not limited to version 20.04. You can attach any LTS version of Ubuntu to extend the support. This will work on versions 20.04, 22.04, and 24.04, giving each release up to 10 years of support (from the original release date). With ESM, 22.04 is supported until 2032, and 24.04 is supported until 2034.
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That should give you plenty of time to decide when/if you want to upgrade to the next LTS (hint: You can always wait until the first point release is made available, such as 24.04.1, so any bugs are worked out).
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