FreeBSD 13 reduces support for i386 architecture
The FreeBSD development team announced that starting from FreeBSD 13.0, the level of support for the i386 architecture will be downgraded to Tier 2. In the future, FreeBSD 14.0 may further reduce the support for the i386 architecture on this basis. For FreeBSD 11.x and 12.x, the i386 architecture support level remains Tier 1.
FreeBSD will continue to provide release images, binary updates, and pre-built packages for the i386 architecture for the 13.x branch. However, specific problems (including SAs) in the 13.x architecture related to i386 may not be fixed.
The i386 architecture has been in existence for 35 years, and major chip companies basically no longer provide i386 chips, and mainstream Linux distributions have gradually stopped supporting the architecture. It is not only an important part of the history and success of the FreeBSD project but also the first and only architecture supported by FreeBSD. The ease of use of the i386 computer is also the key to the development and adoption of FreeBSD.
However, the computer industry and the x86 architecture have been evolving over time. In the past ten years, the 64-bit x86 architecture is the main support architecture for FreeBSD, both from the user’s perspective and from the active development perspective. The size of FreeBSD/i386’s user base continues to decline. Therefore, the support level of the i386 architecture will be downgraded from FreeBSD 13.0 to Tier 2.
