Important

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Supported Versions and Interoperability

This topic provides the supported versions and interoperability of Confluent Platform and its components.

Confluent Platform and Apache Kafka Compatibility

Confluent Platform Apache Kafka® Release Date Standard End of Support Platinum End of Support
5.5.x 2.5.x April 24, 2020 April 24, 2022 April 24, 2023
5.4.x 2.4.x January 10, 2020 January 10, 2022 January 10, 2023
5.3.x 2.3.x July 19, 2019 July 19, 2021 July 19, 2022
5.2.x 2.2.x March 28, 2019 March 28, 2021 March 28, 2022
5.1.x 2.1.x December 14, 2018 December 14, 2020 December 14, 2021
5.0.x 2.0.x July 31, 2018 July 31, 2020 July 31, 2021
4.1.x 1.1.x April 16, 2018 April 16, 2020 April 16, 2021
4.0.x 1.0.x November 28, 2017 November 28, 2019 November 28, 2020
3.3.x 0.11.0.x August 1, 2017 August 1, 2019 August 1, 2020
3.2.x 0.10.2.x March 2, 2017 March 2, 2019 March 2, 2020
3.1.x 0.10.1.x November 15, 2016 November 15, 2018 November 15, 2019
3.0.x 0.10.0.x May 24, 2016 May 24, 2018 May 24, 2019
2.0.x 0.9.0.x December 7, 2015 December 7, 2017 December 7, 2018
1.0.0 – February 25, 2015 February 25, 2017 February 25, 2018

Important

  • The end of support date only applies to minor versions, for example 5.5.x. Maintenance versions follow the same two year lifecycle.
  • The two year support policy is standard. End of support is extended one year for Platinum support agreements.
  • Each version of Confluent Platform includes several component services which are only compatible in that specific Confluent Platform version. There are exceptions, including clients and Confluent Control Center, which can be used across versions. All services included in Confluent Platform are supported, including Apache Kafka® and its subcomponents: Kafka brokers, Apache ZooKeeper™, Java and Scala clients, Kafka Streams, and Kafka Connect.

Preview Releases

Features designated with “preview” status in this documentation are not intended for production use. They should only be used for evaluation and non-production testing purposes or to provide feedback to Confluent. Confluent encourages customers to submit questions and suggestions about preview features using the Confluent Support Portal. Preview features are not “Supported Software” under Confluent’s support policies. Additionally, Confluent may make changes to preview user experience and APIs before they are released for production use.

Operating Systems

Confluent Platform and clients support these operating systems.

Operating System 5.5.x 5.4.x 5.3.x 5.2.x 5.1.x 5.0.x 4.1.x 4.0.x 3.3.x
RHEL/CentOS 6.x (deprecated) yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
RHEL/CentOS 7.x yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
Debian 8 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
Debian 9 yes yes yes no no no no no no
Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (deprecated) yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
Ubuntu 16.04 LTS yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS yes yes yes no no no no no no
  • Windows is not currently supported for Confluent Platform. Windows users can download and use the ZIP and TAR archives, but must run the JAR files directly.
  • Windows is supported by the C/C++ and .NET clients.
  • macOS 10.13 and later is supported for testing and development purposes only.
  • For the file descriptor requirement for Kafka, see File Descriptors and mmap.
  • Control Center requires many open RocksDB files. Set the ulimit for the number of open files (ulimit -n) to a minimum value of 16384.
  • For the other Confluent Platform components, specifically Schema Registry and Replicator, you can leave the ulimit as the OS default.

Confluent Control Center

You can use the Confluent Control Center with compatible Confluent Platform versions.

Confluent Control Center Confluent Platform
5.5.x 3.3.x through 5.5.x
5.4.x 3.3.x through 5.4.x
5.3.x 3.3.x through 5.3.x
5.2.x 3.2.x through 5.2.x
5.1.x 3.2.x through 5.1.x
5.0.x 3.2.x through 5.0.x
4.1.x 3.2.x through 4.1.x
4.0.x 3.2.x through 4.0.x
3.3.x 3.2.x through 3.3.x
3.2.x 3.2.x
3.1.x 3.1.x
3.0.x 3.0.x

Confluent CLI

You can use the Confluent CLI with compatible Confluent Platform versions.

Confluent Platform Confluent CLI
5.5.x 0.265.0 through 1.7.0
5.4.x 0.218.0 through 0.264.0
5.3.x 0.130.0 through 0.145.0
5.2.x Only CLI included in Confluent Platform package
5.1.x Only CLI included in Confluent Platform package
5.0.x Only CLI included in Confluent Platform package
4.1.x Only CLI included in Confluent Platform package
4.0.x Only CLI included in Confluent Platform package
3.3.x Only CLI included in Confluent Platform package

Java

Important

  • Use the latest patch release of each major version of Java to ensure known security vulnerabilities are addressed.
  • Starting with Confluent Platform 5.0, the minimum required version is Java Development Kit (JDK) 8. Java 7 or earlier versions are no longer supported. Use the full JDK, not the Java Runtime Environment (JRE).
  • OpenJDK, Zulu OpenJDK, and Oracle are supported.
Confluent Platform Java Version
5.5.x 1.8.0_202, 11.0_4
5.4.x 1.8.0_202, 11.0_4
5.3.x 1.8.0_60, 11.0_2
5.2.x 1.8.0_60, 11.0_2
5.1.x 1.8.0_60
5.0.x 1.8.0_60
4.1.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
4.0.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
3.3.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
3.2.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
3.1.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
3.0.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
2.0.x 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60
1.0.0 1.7.0_60, 1.8.0_60

ksqlDB

You can use Confluent Platform ksqlDB with compatible Confluent Platform and Kafka versions.

Confluent Platform ksqlDB Confluent Platform Kafka
5.5.x 3.3.0 and later 0.11.0 and later
5.4.x 3.3.0 and later 0.11.0 and later

When you install Confluent Platform, you get a specific version of ksqlDB Standalone. The following table shows which version of ksqlDB Standalone ships with each version of Confluent Platform.

ksqlDB Standalone Confluent Platform
0.10.2 (expected) 6.0.0 (next release)
0.7.1 5.5.x

Scala

Confluent Platform Scala Version
5.5.x 2.11, 2.12
5.4.x 2.11, 2.12
5.3.x 2.11, 2.12
5.2.x 2.11, 2.12
5.1.x 2.11
5.0.x 2.11
4.1.x 2.11
4.0.x 2.11
3.3.x 2.11
3.2.x 2.10, 2.11
3.1.x 2.10, 2.11
3.0.x 2.10, 2.11
2.0.x 2.10, 2.11
1.0.0 2.10, 2.11

ZooKeeper

Confluent Platform ZooKeeper
5.5.x 3.4.10 through 3.5.8 (3.5.8 recommended)
5.4.x 3.4.10 through 3.5.8 (3.5.8 recommended)
5.3.x 3.4.10 through 3.4.14 (3.4.14 recommended)
5.2.x 3.4.10 through 3.4.13 (3.4.13 recommended)
5.1.x 3.4.10 through 3.4.13 (3.4.13 recommended)
5.0.x 3.4.10 through 3.4.13 (3.4.13 recommended)
4.1.x 3.4.10
4.0.x 3.4.10
3.3.x 3.4.10
3.2.x 3.4.6 through 3.4.9
3.1.x 3.4.6 through 3.4.8
3.0.x 3.4.6

For Confluent Platform 5.4.x and 5.5.x, use ZooKeeper 3.5.6 or later to configure TLS connectivity to ZooKeeper.

Component Security

Kafka

Security Feature Confluent Platform
Audit log 2.0.x and later
Authentication via SASL/PLAIN 3.0.x and later
Authentication with SASL/Kerberos and SASL/PLAIN 2.0.x and later
Authentication with SASL/SCRAM 3.1.x and later
Authorization (Access control lists) 2.0.x and later
Integration with secured ZooKeeper 2.0.x and later
SSL Wire Encryption 2.0.x and later

Kafka Connect clients

Security Feature Confluent Platform
Authentication and Encryption with secured Kafka brokers 2.0.x and later

Apache Kafka Streams clients

Security Feature Confluent Platform
Authentication and Encryption with secured Kafka brokers 3.0.x and later

Apache ZooKeeper™

Security Feature Confluent Platform
Authentication with SASL/Kerberos and SASL/PLAIN 2.0.x and later
Authorization (Access control lists) 2.0.x and later

Confluent Control Center

Security Feature Confluent Platform
HTTPS 3.0.x and later

Authentication and Encryption with secured Kafka brokers:

  • User login with HTTP Basic Authentication
 3.0.x and later

REST Proxy

Security Feature Confluent Platform
Authentication and Encryption with secured Kafka brokers 3.1.x and later
HTTPS (SSL) for REST clients 3.0.x and later

Schema Registry

Security Feature Confluent Platform
Authentication and Encryption with secured Kafka brokers 3.0.x and later
HTTPS (SSL) for REST clients 3.0.x and later

Clients

Client Confluent Platform

.NET

  • Targets frameworks net451 and netstandard1.3.
  • Supported on the .NET Framework 4.5.1 and and .NET Core 1.0 and later.
  • Not supported on Mono.
 3.2.x and later

C/C++

  • greater than C99
  • greater than C++98
 3.1.x and later

Go

  • Golang greater than 1.2
  • librdkafka greater than 0.9.4
 3.1.x and later
Java See the supported Java versions.
JMS Client 3.2.x and later

Python

 3.0.x and later

Connectors

Refer to individual connector documentation for Confluent Platform interoperability information. See Supported Connectors for a list of supported connectors.

Cross-Component Compatibility

Kafka Connect Workers

Confluent Platform 3.1 and earlier
Kafka Connect Workers must be a version lower or equal to the Kafka brokers (i.e. upgrade brokers first).
Confluent Platform 3.2 and later
Kafka Connect Workers that are included in Confluent Platform 3.2 and later are compatible with any Kafka broker that is included in Confluent Platform 3.0 and later.

Kafka Java Clients

Confluent Platform 3.1 and earlier
Kafka Java Clients must be a version lower than or equal to the Kafka brokers (i.e. upgrade brokers first). The minimum supported Kafka Java Client version is 0.8.
Confluent Platform 3.2 and later
Kafka Java Clients that are included in Confluent Platform 3.2 (Kafka version 0.10.2) and later are compatible with any Kafka broker that is included in Confluent Platform 3.0 and later.

Kafka Streams Clients

Refer to Kafka Streams Compatibility Matrix for the version compatibility between Kafka Streams clients and Kafka brokers.

Auto Data Balancing

Compatible with Confluent Platform 3.1.x brokers and later. Disk free space protection requires Confluent Platform 3.2.x or later.

Confluent C, C++, Python, Go and .NET

All versions of Confluent’s non-Java clients are compatible with all versions of Confluent Platform.

Schema Registry

Confluent Platform 3.1 and earlier
Schema Registry must be a version lower than or equal to the Kafka brokers (i.e. upgrade brokers first).
Confluent Platform 3.2 and later
Schema Registry that is included in Confluent Platform 3.2 and later is compatible with any Kafka broker that is included in Confluent Platform 3.0 and later.

Replicator

For data transfer Replicator maintains the same compatibility matrix as Java clients, detailed in Kafka Java Clients. However some Replicator features have different compatibility requirements:

  • Schema Translation requires that both source and destination clusters are running Confluent 5.2.0 or later.
  • Offset Translation requires that both source and destination clusters are running Confluent 5.1.0 or later.
  • Automatic topic creation and config sync requires that the destination cluster is at a later version than the source cluster.

REST Proxy

Confluent Platform 3.1 and earlier
REST Proxy must be a version lower than or equal to the Kafka brokers (i.e. upgrade brokers first).
Confluent Platform 3.2 and later
REST Proxy that is included in Confluent Platform 3.2 and later is compatible with any Kafka broker that is included in Confluent Platform 3.0 and later.

Orchestration Tools

Kubernetes

Confluent Operator simplifies running Confluent Platform on Kubernetes, whether on-premises or in the cloud. Operator implements the Kubernetes Operator pattern to deliver enterprise-ready, Kubernetes-native automation of deployment and key lifecycle operations. Refer to Confluent Operator Supported Environments for details about Confluent Operator and supported Kubernetes environments.

The following table describes the version compatibilities among Confluent Platform, Confluent Operator, and Kubernetes.

Operator Version Compatible Confluent Platform Versions Compatible Kubernetes Versions Release Date End of Support
1.6.x 5.5.x, 6.0.x 1.15 - 1.18 September 24, 2020 September 24, 2021
1.5.x 5.5.x 1.13 - 1.18 April 24, 2020 April 24, 2022 [1]
1.4.x 5.4.x 1.11 - 1.15 January 22, 2020 January 22, 2021 [2]
1.3.x 5.3.x 1.9 - 1.15 July 31, 2019 July 31, 2020 [3]
  • [1] Best-effort support for Operator 1.5.x will be provided until April 24, 2022 if and when feasible to do.
  • [2] Best-effort support for Operator 1.4.x will be provided until January 22, 2022 if and when feasible to do so.
  • [3] Best-effort support for Operator 1.3.x will be provided until July 31, 2021 if and when feasible to do so.

The following table summarizes the Confluent Platform features supported with Confluent Operator.

Confluent Platform 5.5 Feature Availability in Operator 1.6.0
Kafka Broker Available, only via Confluent Server
ZooKeeper Available
Schema Registry Available
REST Proxy Not available
ksqlDB Available
Connect Available
Control Center Available
Replicator Available
Role-based Access Control Available *
Structured Audit Logs Available
MDS-based Access Control Lists (ACLs) Not available
ZooKeeper-based ACLs Available
Secrets Protection Not available
Schema Validation Available
FIPS Not available
Multi-region Clusters Not available
Tiered Storage (Preview) Not available
Auto Data Balancer Available

[*] Only available for new installations, only supports mTLS mechanism for client authentication, and does not support central management of RBAC across multiple Kafka clusters.

Ansible

Confluent provides Ansible playbooks that give you a simple way to configure and deploy Confluent Platform on a traditional VM or bare metal infrastructure. Refer to the Ansible documentation for details.

Ansible 2.7 or later is required.

The following table summarizes the Confluent Platform features supported with Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform.

Confluent Platform 5.5 Feature Availability in Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform 5.5
Kafka Broker Available
ZooKeeper Available
Schema Registry Available
REST Proxy Available
ksqlDB Available
Connect Available
Control Center Available
Replicator Not available
Role-based Access Control Available *
Structured Audit Logs Not available
MDS-based Access Control Lists (ACLs) Available **
ZooKeeper-based ACLs Not available
Secrets Protection Not available
Schema Validation Available
FIPS Not available
Multi-region Clusters Available
Tiered Storage (Preview) Not available
Auto Data Balancer Not available

[*] Only available for new installations and does not support central management of RBAC across multiple Kafka clusters.

[**] Only available for new installations and does not support central management of ACLs across multiple Kafka clusters.

You can manually configure the features marked as Not available outside of the scope of Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform. If you take the hybrid installation approach, refer to the appropriate installation document in Confluent documentation to ensure your install path of mixing Ansible installation and manual installation is supported.

Docker

If you are not using a higher-level container orchestration system like Kubernetes, Confluent Platform Docker images are available for use directly with Docker. Docker version 1.11 or later running on a supported operating system is required to use the Docker images.

Release Docker Image Operating System Zulu OpenJDK Version Python Version Scala Version
5.5.x cp-base-new Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-control-center Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-server Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-kafka Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka-connect Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka-connect-base Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator -executable Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka-rest Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-schema-registry Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-ksqldb-cli Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-ksqldb-server Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-base-new RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-control-center RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-server RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-kafka RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka-connect RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka-connect-base RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-ksqldb-cli RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-ksqldb-server RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator -executable RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka-rest RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-schema-registry RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
5.4.x cp-base-new Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-control-center Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-server Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-kafka Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka-connect Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka-connect-base Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator -executable Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-kafka-rest Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-schema-registry Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-ksqldb-cli Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-ksqldb-server Debian 8 (deprecated) 8.38.0.13 2.7.9-1 2.12
cp-base-new RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-control-center RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-server RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-kafka RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka-connect RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka-connect-base RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-ksqldb-cli RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-ksqldb-server RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-enterprise-replicator -executable RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-kafka-rest RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12
cp-schema-registry RHEL UBI 8 8.40.0.25 3.6.8-15 2.12

Important

Starting on July 1, 2020, the Confluent Platform Docker images based off the Debian 8 or 9 operating systems will no longer be available.

DC/OS

  • Confluent has partnered with D2iQ to provide DC/OS packaging for Confluent Platform. This has been tested, evaluated, and successfully deployed with customers. There are a few scenarios that require non-standard configurations. Please contact Confluent Support if you have plans to deploy on top of DC/OS.
  • Certified packages of Confluent Platform can be found for DC/OS Versions 1.11, 1.12, and 1.13.
  • All Confluent services, except the core Kafka broker and ZooKeeper services, are deployed as Marathon-managed Docker containers. There is minimal variation in that support across DC/OS versions.

For more information, see the Mesosphere DC/OS documentation.

Web Browsers

The following web browsers are supported by Confluent Control Center and Confluent Cloud.

Browser Supported Version
Apple Safari Latest Stable
Google Chrome Latest Stable
Mozilla Firefox Latest Stable