LTS stands for "Long Term Support release". These Ubuntu releases are considered to be especially stable and receive official support longer than normal releases. A new LTS comes out every 2 years. This tag should be used for questions regarding LTS releases in general. For questions about a specific LTS release please use the respective version tag.

The LTS (Long Term Support) releases that have come out so far include:

  • 6.06 Dapper Drake (no longer supported)
  • 8.04 Hardy Heron (no longer supported)
  • 10.04 Lucid Lynx (no longer supported)
  • 12.04 Precise Pangolin (no longer supported)
  • 14.04 Trusty Tahr (no longer supported)
  • 16.04 Xenial Xerus (no longer supported)
  • 18.04 Bionic Beaver (desktop and server both supported until April 2023)
  • 20.04 Focal Fossa (desktop and server both supported until April 2025)

Unlike regular releases of Ubuntu, LTS releases can be upgraded directly from one to the next, without the need to upgrade to all intermediate releases in between.

For example, an Ubuntu 10.04 LTS system can be upgraded directly to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS. In contrast, an Ubuntu 10.10 system would have to be upgraded to 11.04, and then to 11.10, and then finally to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.