Supported Versions and Interoperability for Confluent Platform¶
This topic provides the supported version and interoperability information for Confluent Platform and its components for Confluent Platform 7.6 and older. Note that older versions are removed as their support windows end. If a newer Confluent Platform version exists, you can select it in the version picker in the lower left to view its interoperability and version support.
Confluent Platform and Apache Kafka compatibility¶
| Confluent Platform | Apache Kafka® | Release Date | Standard End of Support | Platinum End of Support |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 3.6.x | February 9, 2024 | February 9, 2026 | February 9, 2027 |
| 7.5.x | 3.5.x | August 25, 2023 | August 25, 2025 | August 25, 2026 |
| 7.4.x | 3.4.x | May 3, 2023 | May 3, 2025 | May 3, 2026 |
| 7.3.x | 3.3.x | November 4, 2022 | November 4, 2024 | November 4, 2025 |
| 7.2.x | 3.2.x | July 6, 2022 | July 6, 2024 | July 6, 2025 |
| 7.1.x | 3.1.x | April 5, 2022 | April 5, 2024 | April 5, 2025 |
| 7.0.x | 3.0.x | October 27, 2021 | October 27, 2023 | October 27, 2024 |
| 6.2.x | 2.8.x | June 8, 2021 | June 8, 2023 | June 8, 2024 |
| 6.1.x | 2.7.x | February 9, 2021 | February 9, 2023 | February 9, 2024 |
Note the following about Confluent Platform versions and support levels:
Standard support means any support level below Platinum support. For example, if you have Gold support, you have Standard support.
The end of support date applies to minor versions and any maintenance versions that come after the minor version. This means that maintenance versions follow the same two year lifecycle of the minor version. For example, the standard support for Confluent Platform 6.1.x ends on February 9, 2023.
The two year support policy is standard. End of support is extended one year for Platinum support agreements.
Platinum support does not extend the support timeline for Confluent for Kubernetes (CFK) / Operator.
You can apply your Platinum support contract to the Confluent Platform components deployed by CFK / Operator when both of the following conditions are true:
- You are on a currently supported version of CFK / Operator. See Supported versions of CFK.
- The Confluent Platform version you want to use is compatible with a currently supported version of CFK / Operator.
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.
It is recommended that you run Confluent Platform across uniform OS, Confluent Platform, and JAVA versions.
Currently, Confluent Platform supports X86 hardware architecture. ARM64 is supported in Confluent Platform 7.6.0 and later.
| Operating System | 7.6.x | 7.5.x | 7.4.x | 7.3.x | 7.2.x | 7.1.x | 7.0.x | 6.2.x | 6.1.x |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RHEL 9.x | yes | yes | yes | no | no | no | no | no | no |
| RHEL/CentOS 8.x | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes |
| RHEL/CentOS 7.x (deprecated *) | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes |
| Debian 10 (buster) | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | no | no |
| Debian 9 (stretch) (deprecated *) | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes |
| Rocky Linux 9 | yes | no | no | no | no | no | no | no | no |
| Rocky Linux 8 | yes | no | no | no | no | no | no | no | no |
| Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (focal) | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | no | no |
| Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (bionic) | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes |
| Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (xenial) (deprecated *) | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes |
* Deprecated: Support for these OS versions is deprecated because they have reached their end of life. The OS is currently supported for Confluent Platform 7.6, but this support may be removed in a future release.
- SELinux
- Confluent Platform is supported on RHEL, CentOS, Debian, Ubuntu, and Rocky Linux Operating Systems. Confluent is not accountable for Security-Enhanced Linux (SELinux) policy development, support, or enforcement. If you experience issues running Confluent Platform with SELinux enabled on a supported Linux Operating System, contact your OS provider for assistance.
- Windows
Windows is not currently supported for Confluent Platform.
Windows 8.1 and later, as well as Windows 2016 and later, are supported by the C/C++ and .NET clients.
- macOS
- macOS 10.14 and later is supported for testing and development purposes only.
- File descriptors
- For the file descriptor requirement for Kafka, see File Descriptors and mmap.
- ulimit
Control Center requires many open RocksDB files. Set the
ulimitfor the number of open files to a minimum value of 16384 using theulimit -ncommand.For the other Confluent Platform components, specifically Schema Registry and Replicator, you can leave the
ulimitas the OS default.- RHEL with TLS
When installing Confluent Platform on RHEL8 with TLS encryption, you must add DH Key Size JVM Parameters for each component. For more information, see Strong crypto defaults in RHEL 8 and deprecation of weak crypto algorithms.
Set the following component-level environment variables to the argument:
- Control Center:
CONTROL_CENTER_OPTS=-Djdk.tls.ephemeralDHKeySize=2048 - Schema Registry:
SCHEMA_REGISTRY_OPTS=-Djdk.tls.ephemeralDHKeySize=2048 - Kafka, ZooKeeper, and Connect:
KAFKA_OPTS=-Djdk.tls.ephemeralDHKeySize=2048 - REST Proxy:
KAFKAREST_OPTS=-Djdk.tls.ephemeralDHKeySize=2048 - ksqlDB:
KSQL_OPTS=-Djdk.tls.ephemeralDHKeySize=2048
- Control Center:
- atime
The
atimemount option impacts performance, because every read operation on a file system causes a write operation.Confluent recommends disabling the tracking of
atimeby setting thenoatimeoption when you mount Kafka data disks.
Java¶
You need to separately install the correct version of Java before you start the Confluent Platform installation process.
The following table lists Java support in Confluent Platform by version. Note the following:
- You should use the full JDK to help Confluent Support with troubleshooting and to provide better support if you experience issues with Confluent Platform.
- OpenJDK, Zulu OpenJDK, Eclipse Temurin (formerly known as AdoptOpenJDK), and Oracle are supported with Confluent Platform.
- Docker images require version 11. For more information, see Docker.
| Confluent Platform | Recommended | Supported |
|---|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 17 | 17, 11, 8 * |
| 7.5.x | 17 | 17, 11, 8 * |
| 7.4.x | 17 | 17, 11, 8 * |
| 7.3.x | 17 | 17, 11, 8 |
| 7.2.x | 11 | 11, 8 |
| 7.1 | 11 or 8 | 11, 8 |
| 7.0 | 11 or 8 | 11, 8 |
| 6.2 | 11 or 8 | 11, 8 |
| 6.1 | 11 or 8 | 11, 8 |
| 6.0 | 11 or 8 | 11, 8 |
* Java 8 is now deprecated in Confluent Platform, and will be removed in a future version.
From a security perspective, you should use the latest released patch version because older versions may have security vulnerabilities.
Java 9 and 10 are not supported in Confluent Platform as those versions are short-term rapid release versions.
For more information about Java versions, see Java Version History.
Scala¶
| Confluent Platform | Scala for Packages and Docker | Scala for Maven JARs |
|---|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 7.5.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 7.4.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 7.3.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 7.2.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 7.1.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 7.0.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 6.2.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
| 6.1.x | 2.13 | 2.12, 2.13 |
Confluent Control Center¶
You can use the Control Center for Confluent Platform with compatible Confluent Platform versions.
| Confluent Control Center | Confluent Platform |
|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 6.1.0 through 7.6.x |
| 7.5.x | 6.0.0 through 7.5.x |
| 7.4.x | 6.0.0 through 7.4.x |
| 7.3.x | 5.4.x through 7.3.x |
| 7.2.x | 5.3.x through 7.2.x |
| 7.1.x | 5.2.x through 7.1.x |
| 7.0.x | 5.1.x through 7.0.x |
| 6.2.x | 5.0.x through 6.2.x |
| 6.1.x | 4.1.x through 6.1.x |
| 6.0.x | 4.0.x through 6.0.x |
Confluent CLI¶
You can use the Confluent CLI with compatible Confluent Platform versions.
| Confluent Platform | Confluent CLI |
|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 3.48.0 through most recent 3.x version |
| 7.5.x | 3.2.1 through most recent 3.x version |
| 7.4.x | 3.2.1 through most recent 3.x version |
| 7.3.x | 2.28.1 through most recent 2.x version |
| 7.2.x | 2.19.0 through most recent 2.x version |
| 7.1.x | 2.6.1 through most recent 2.x version |
| 7.0.x | 1.40.0 through most recent 1.x version |
| 6.2.x | 1.30.0 through most recent 1.x version |
| 6.1.x | 1.22.0 through most recent 1.x version |
| 6.0.x | 1.11.0 through most recent 1.x version |
To install and use a later version of the CLI than the version that shipped with Confluent Platform, you must download and install the later version using these instructions.
ksqlDB¶
You can use Confluent Platform ksqlDB with compatible Confluent Platform and Kafka versions.
Starting with version 5.4.x, Confluent Platform ksqlDB is compatible with:
- Confluent Platform 3.3.0 and later;
- Kafka 0.11.0 and later.
When you install Confluent Platform, you get a specific version of ksqlDB. The following table shows which version of ksqlDB ships with each version of Confluent Platform.
| Confluent Platform | ksqlDB | Kafka Streams version |
|---|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 7.6.0-137 | 3.6.0 |
| 7.5.x | 0.29.0 | 3.5.0 |
| 7.4.x | 0.28.3-RC7 | 3.4.0 |
| 7.3.x | 0.28.2 | 3.3.2 |
| 7.2.x | 0.26.0 | 3.2.0 |
| 7.1.x | 0.23.1 | 3.1.0 |
| 7.0.x | 0.21.0 | 3.0.0 |
| 6.2.x | 0.17.0 | 2.8.0 |
| 6.1.x | 0.14.0 | 2.7.0 |
| 6.0.x | 0.10.2 | 2.6.0 |
ZooKeeper¶
ZooKeeper was upgraded in December 2023 to version 3.8.3 in Confluent Platform versions 6.1.x through 7.6. For information on upgrading, see Upgrade ZooKeeper.
Note
Starting with Confluent Platform 7.4, KRaft is generally available and the default option for metadata management for new Apache Kafka® clusters. For more information, see KRaft Overview for Confluent Platform.
| Confluent Platform | Apache ZooKeeper™ |
|---|---|
| 7.6.x | 3.5.6 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 7.5.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 7.4.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 7.3.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 7.2.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 7.1.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 7.0.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 6.2.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 6.1.x | 3.4.10 through 3.8.3 (3.8.3 recommended) |
| 6.0.x | 3.4.10 through 3.5.9 (3.5.9 recommended) |
For Confluent Platform 6.0.x, 6.1.x, 6.2.x, 7.0.x, 7.1.x, and 7.2.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 with 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 |
| TLS/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:
|
3.0.x and later |
| Single Sign-On (SSO) | 7.5.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 |
|---|---|
| Access Control (RBAC) for Schema Linking Exporters | 7.0.9, 7.1.7, 7.2.5, 7.3.2, 7.3.3, 7.4.0, and later. |
| Authentication and Encryption with secured Kafka brokers | 3.0.x and later |
| HTTPS (SSL) for REST clients | 3.0.x and later |
Clients¶
To learn more about features and details of supported clients, see Build Client Applications for Confluent Platform.
| Client | System Requirements |
|---|---|
| .NET |
|
| C/C++ |
|
| Golang |
|
| Python |
|
| Java |
|
| JavaScript |
|
| JMS Client |
|
Connectors¶
Refer to individual connector documentation for Confluent Platform interoperability information. See Supported Connectors for a list of supported connectors.
Cross-component compatibility¶
The following sections describe version compatibility between Kafka brokers and individual components.
Kafka Connect workers¶
- 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¶
Following is version compatibility for Java clients. Note that versions may be compatible, but support is offered for a specific time window for each version. For a table of release and end of support dates for Java clients by version number, see Java client support.
- 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. Note that although all versions are compatible, support is provided for a specific time window by version. For a table of release and end of support dates for librdkafka and derived clients by version number, see librdkafka and derived client support.
Schema Registry¶
- 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.
- The
timestamp-interceptorfor consumers supports only Java clients, as described in Configuring the consumer for failover (timestamp preservation).
REST Proxy¶
- 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¶
Confluent for Kubernetes¶
For details about the supported Kubernetes environments, refer to Confluent for Kubernetes Supported Environments.
The following table summarizes the Confluent Platform features supported with Confluent for Kubernetes.
| Confluent Platform 7.6 Feature | Availability in CFK 2.8 |
|---|---|
| Kafka Broker | Available, only via Confluent Server |
| ZooKeeper | Available |
| Schema Registry | Available |
| REST Proxy | Available |
| ksqlDB | Available |
| Connect | Available |
| Control Center | Available |
| Replicator | Available |
| Security: Role-based Access Control | Available [1] |
| Security: Authentication | Available [2] |
| Security: Network Encryption | Available |
| Structured Audit Logs | Available [3] |
| MDS-based Access Control Lists (ACLs) | Available |
| ZooKeeper-based ACLs | Available |
| Secrets Protection | Available [4] |
| Schema Validation | Available |
| FIPS | Available |
| Multi-region Clusters | Available |
| Tiered Storage | Available |
| Self-Balancing Clusters | Available |
| Auto Data Balancer | Use Self-Balancing Clusters |
| ZooKeeper TLS/SSL | Available |
| Confluent REST API | Available |
| Cluster Registry | Not Available |
| Cluster Linking | Available |
| Health+ | Available |
- [1] Only available for new installations.
- [2] Supports SASL/Plain and mTLS for Kafka authentication. Does not support Kerberos or SASL/Scram.
- [3] Supported through Kafka and ZooKeeper configuration overrides. See Configure Audit Logs using the Properties File in Confluent Platform for the properties you need to set in config overrides. Does not support centrally managed Audit Logs.
- [4] Kubernetes Secrets are integrated. CFK does not enable you to use Confluent Secret Protection.
Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform¶
Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform (Confluent Ansible) provides you a simple way to configure and deploy Confluent Platform on a traditional VM or bare metal infrastructure. For more information, see Ansible documentation .
For version compatibility among Confluent Ansible, Confluent Platform, Ansible, and Python, see Ansible Requirements.
The following table summarizes the Confluent Platform features supported with Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform.
| Confluent Platform 7.6 Feature | Availability in Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform 7.6 |
|---|---|
| Kafka Broker | Available |
| ZooKeeper | Available |
| Schema Registry | Available |
| REST Proxy | Available |
| ksqlDB | Available |
| Connect | Available |
| Control Center | Available [1] |
| Replicator | Available [2] |
| Security: Authentication | Available [3] |
| Security: Role-based Access Control (RBAC) | Available |
| Security: Network Encryption | Available |
| Structured Audit Logs | Available |
| MDS-based Access Control Lists (ACLs) | Available [4] |
| ZooKeeper-based ACLs | Not available |
| Secrets Protection | Available [5] |
| Schema Validation | Available |
| FIPS | Available |
| Multi-region Clusters | Available |
| Tiered Storage | Available |
| Self-Balancing Clusters | Available |
| Auto Data Balancer | Not available |
| ZooKeeper TLS/SSL | Available |
| Confluent REST API | Available |
| Health+ | Available |
| Cluster Registry | Available |
| Cluster Linking | Available |
- [1] Cannot configure Control Center to monitor multiple Kafka clusters.
- [2] Cannot have RBAC enabled on the source or target cluster.
- [3] Cannot enable both SASL and mTLS for ZooKeeper out of the box. See Ansible Troubleshooting for enabling both authentication modes using config overrides.
- [4] Only available for new installations. Does not support centrally managing ACLs across multiple Kafka clusters.
- [5] Does not support ZooKeeper configuration Secrets.
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 Reference | Operating System | Zulu OpenJDK Version | Python Version | Scala Version |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7.6.x | Docker Image Reference for Confluent Platform | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.21 | 3.9.18 | 2.13 |
| 7.5.x | Docker Image Reference (7.5) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.20 | 3.9.13 | 2.13 |
| 7.4.x | Docker Image Reference (7.4) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.18 | 3.9.13 | 2.13 |
| 7.3.x | Docker Image Reference (7.3) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.15-1 | 3.9.7 | 2.13 |
| 7.2.x | Docker Image Reference (7.2) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.15-1 | 3.6.8 | 2.13 |
| 7.1.x | Docker Image Reference (7.1) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.15-1 | 3.6.8 | 2.13 |
| 7.0.x | Docker Image Reference (7.0) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.15-1 | 3.6.8 | 2.13 |
| 6.2.x | Docker Image Reference (6.2) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.15-1 | 3.6.8 | 2.13 |
| 6.1.x | Docker Image Reference (6.1) | RHEL UBI 8 | 11.0.15-1 | 3.6.8 | 2.13 |
MirrorMaker¶
MirrorMaker 2 is supported as a stand-alone executable, but is not supported as a connector.
The following Confluent products provide more complete solutions that handle topic configuration, data, and schemas to improve availability, scalability, and ease of use.
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 |
VMWare¶
When you run Confluent Platform on VMWare, note the following:
- You should enable compression to help mitigate the performance impacts while maintaining business continuity.
- You should disable vMotion and disk snapshotting for Confluent Platform as the features could cause a full cluster outage when used with Kafka.
Confluent supports customers who choose to run Confluent Platform on VMWare VMotion. However, the scope of support will be limited to questions and fixes which are related to Confluent Platform itself and not troubleshooting or debugging VMotion (which is outside the scope of Confluent Support). For more information, see Running Confluent Platform on VMWare VMotion (requires sign in) on the Confluent Support portal and VMware optimization.