Satellite: Infrastructure Automation Ledger 2026 Scorecard

Part of the Infrastructure Automation Ledger (edition 2026-10-16). How the scores work: methodology.

Snapshot

Type: product
Owner: Red Hat, Inc. (Raleigh, USA), an IBM subsidiary since 2019-07-09
Engine: The Foreman with Katello (Pulp for content, Candlepin for subscriptions)
Licence: Subscription (Smart Management with Satellite); the upstream code is GPL-3.0; no free tier; no Red Hat price list, reseller listings of about US$1,350 to 1,390 per year for a 2-socket entitlement
Latest release: 6.19 (2026-05-06); 6.19.5 (2026-09-30)
Support lifecycle: About 12 months of full support, then maintenance, then optional paid Extended Update Support (since 6.16); N-2 policy; 6.19 maintenance ends 2027-11-01
Next milestone: 6.20 limited availability in November 2026 (containers on RHEL 10, fresh install only); general availability in 2027
Targets: Bare metal (PXE, UEFI HTTP boot, discovery, boot disk); VMs on vSphere, libvirt (RHEL 10 hosts since 6.19), OpenStack, EC2, Azure and Google Compute; OpenShift Virtualization in Technology Preview; no Proxmox VE, Nutanix, Hyper-V or XCP-ng on the supported list; no network or storage targets
Tier: Host and bare-metal provisioning
Archetype: Integrated stack
Evidence grade: B. GA dates, the lifecycle policy, the 6.19 release notes and Technology Preview list and the 6.20 announcement were read from Red Hat pages. Pricing rests on reseller listings only. Capability before 2026 is inferred from the release record and held flat where no dated trigger could be sourced.

Scope of the scores: Satellite has no plan or dry-run mode of its own; preview comes from the engines it drives (Puppet noop through OpenVox, Ansible check mode) and drift shows in configuration and compliance reports.

Scorecard

Dimension	Score	Direction
Capability today	53.6 / 100	higher is better
Momentum since end of 2022	+3.2 points (2015 to 2022: +0.0)	higher is better
Credibility	16.5 / 25	higher is better
Commercial risk	12.0 / 25	lower is better
Technical lock-in	10.0 / 25	lower is better
Integrator fit	13.0 / 20	higher is better
AI leverage	4.0 / 20	higher is better
Ledger Index	52.5 / 100	balanced weights; see the methodology

Capability by domain, 2015 to today

Scores 0 to 5 against fixed anchors; total is weighted to 100.

Domain (weight)	2015	2019	2022	Today
Provisioning breadth (15)	2	2	2	2.5
Configuration management depth (12)	2.5	2.5	2.5	2.5
State, planning and safety (12)	1.5	1.5	1.5	1.5
Language and authoring (10)	2.5	2.5	2.5	2.5
Orchestration and self-service (10)	3.5	3.5	3.5	3.5
Scale and control plane (8)	3.5	3.5	3.5	3.5
Security and compliance (10)	3	3	3	3.5
Bare metal and day-2 operations (8)	4	4	4	4
Ecosystem and integrations (8)	3	3	3	3
AI assistance (7)	0	0	0	0.5
Total / 100	50.4	50.4	50.4	53.6

Year by year: 2015: 50.4 · 2016: 50.4 · 2017: 50.4 · 2018: 50.4 · 2019: 50.4 · 2020: 50.4 · 2021: 50.4 · 2022: 50.4 · 2023: 50.4 · 2024: 50.4 · 2025: 51.1 · 2026: 53.6

What moved the score

Year	Domain	Change	Points	Trigger
2025	AI assistance	0 → 0.5	+0.7	6.18: MCP server in Technology Preview (still preview in 6.19)
2026	Provisioning breadth	2 → 2.5	+1.5	6.19: OpenShift Virtualization provisioning (Technology Preview) joins EC2, Azure, Google, OpenStack, libvirt and vSphere
2026	Security and compliance	3 → 3.5	+1.0	6.19: Lightspeed vulnerability service fully supported, SSH certificates for remote execution; RHEL 10 content signed with ML-DSA

Direction, 2023 to 2026

Each release item carries one theme and one driver (V vision, C customer need, M market window, U upstream, P portfolio).

Date	Item	Theme	Driver
2024-11	6.16: paid Extended Update Support introduced	Licensing	P
2025-05	6.17: advisor and vulnerability features work without external connectivity (vendor claim)	Security	C
2025-11	6.18: MCP server (Technology Preview)	AI	V
2025-11	6.18: Lightspeed vulnerability service (Technology Preview)	Security	P
2026-05	6.19: Lightspeed vulnerability service fully supported	Security	P
2026-05	6.19: libvirt provisioning on RHEL 10 hypervisors	Provisioning breadth	U
2026-05	6.19: OpenShift Virtualization provisioning plugin (Technology Preview)	Provisioning breadth	P
2026-05	6.19: Puppet delivered as OpenVox 8 packages	Configuration management	U
2026-05	6.19: SSH certificates for remote execution; registration without port 80	Security	C
2026-05	6.19: multiple content view environments, job template cloning, image mode host package tracking	Orchestration	C
2026-05	6.19: PXE-less discovery with kexec (Technology Preview)	Bare metal	C
2026-09	6.20 limited availability announced for November 2026: containers on RHEL 10, fresh install only, GA in 2027	Packaging	P
2026-09	6.20: ML-DSA post-quantum content signing support	Security	V
2026-09	6.20 GA promised to bring expanded AI-assisted capabilities (no detail)	AI	V

Centre of gravity: Security (5), AI (2), Provisioning breadth (2)
Blind spots (no items): State and planning, Language, Scale, Ecosystem
Driver mix: Vision 21%, Customer need 29%, Market window 0%, Upstream 14%, Portfolio 36%
Idea-to-need index: 0.43 (0 = demand-pulled, 1 = thesis-pushed)

Credibility: 16.5 / 25

Criterion	Score	Basis
Cadence	4.5	Two minors a year in spring and autumn since 2018 (6.11 slipped to July 2022); monthly z-streams
Roadmap transparency	2.5	Release notes public; knowledge base behind a login; roadmap only in blog posts; 6.20 GA given as 2027 without a date
Say-do	3	The vulnerability service went from preview (6.18) to GA (6.19) in six months; the MCP server is still preview after two releases; 6.20 is pending
Velocity	3	A few capabilities per minor on top of maintenance
Lifecycle stability	3.5	Published N-2 policy, about 12 months full support plus maintenance and paid EUS; the 6.20 limited availability build needs a fresh install on RHEL 10

Commercial risk: 12.0 / 25 (lower is better)

Criterion	Score	Basis
Price and licence volatility	2	No public price list; no change found since 2023; reseller prices only
Purchase constraints	3	Subscription only, layered on RHEL and Smart Management subscriptions; no free edition
Channel and access	2.5	Direct and resellers; software, errata and part of the knowledge base behind the customer portal
Owner stability	1.5	IBM subsidiary since 2019-07-09, run as its own division; no strategy reversal found
Cost of staying supported	3	Two minors a year under an N-2 policy; Extended Update Support costs extra since 6.16; the 6.20 early access build is a reinstall

Technical lock-in: 10.0 / 25 (lower is better)

Criterion	Score	Basis
Formats	1.5	Open APIs, plain-text templates, Pulp repositories
Export path	2	Same code base as upstream Foreman and Katello, but no documented migration either way
Stack coupling	3	RHEL hosts only; Pulp and Candlepin; 6.20 needs RHEL 10 containers
Hardware / cloud coupling	1	Any x86 server running RHEL; disconnected operation documented
Skills and tooling coupling	2.5	Red Hat and Foreman specific concepts and training

Integrator fit: 13.0 / 20

Criterion	Score	Basis
Partner programme openness	3	Red Hat partner programme exists; terms not read for this edition
Multi-tenancy and self-service	3	Organisations and locations with RBAC; no requester portal
API and infrastructure-as-code	3.5	REST API, Hammer CLI and Ansible content
Skills and certification	3.5	Red Hat training and exams cover Satellite (course list not re-verified)

AI leverage: 4.0 / 20

How the product uses AI, scored per year like capability. Only GA counts.

Criterion	2019	2022	Today	Latest step
AI code and plan generation	0	0	0	2015: None
AI platform stack	0	0	0	2015: None
AI-assisted operations	0	0	1	2026: 6.19: Lightspeed vulnerability service fully supported (rule-based vulnerability analytics)
Agent openness	2	2	3	2025: 6.18: MCP server in Technology Preview, able to patch hosts and manage content views; still preview in 6.19

Year by year: 2015: 2 · 2016: 2 · 2017: 2 · 2018: 2 · 2019: 2 · 2020: 2 · 2021: 2 · 2022: 2 · 2023: 2 · 2024: 2 · 2025: 3 · 2026: 4

AI say-do, 2023 to 2026: 3 AI items announced; 1 GA, 1 still preview, 1 pending, 0 dropped. The GA item is the vulnerability service; the MCP server has been preview for two releases and the 6.20 AI items have no published detail.

Satellite's AI so far is the Lightspeed vulnerability service, which is analytics rather than generation, and an MCP server that has stayed in Technology Preview since 6.18. Red Hat promises more AI-assisted capability at 6.20 GA in 2027 without saying what.

Reading

Satellite scores close to upstream Foreman on capability and above it on security and lifecycle, which is what the subscription buys: a published N-2 policy, Red Hat compliance content and a vulnerability service that went GA within six months of preview. The costs are commercial: subscription only, RHEL only, paid Extended Update Support, and a hypervisor list that stops at vSphere, libvirt and a preview of OpenShift Virtualization. The 6.20 generation moves to containers on RHEL 10 with a fresh install in the limited availability build, so an upgrade plan is the one thing to check before committing a 2027 budget.

Open questions and items to re-score

Red Hat's own price and metric for Satellite were not found; reseller listings are indicative only.
Whether Proxmox VE or Nutanix provisioning is supportable through upstream plugins was not found on Red Hat pages.
BMC power management is not mentioned in the 6.19 provisioning pages read.
6.20 GA date, in-place upgrade guidance and the promised AI capabilities are unpublished.
The MCP server is still Technology Preview; re-score when it reaches full support.
Partner programme terms and the current certification list were not read.

	’25	’26
Provisioning breadth		1
Configuration management depth
State, planning and safety
Language and authoring
Orchestration and self-service
Scale and control plane
Security and compliance		2
Bare metal and day-2 operations
Ecosystem and integrations
AI assistance	1