It’s there – Oracle AI Database 26ai is available for download

Posted on January 27, 2026 by Oracle AI Database 26ai 33

This was a long wait – and finally, it’s there – Oracle AI Database 26ai is available for download on-prem. And as you may remember our announcement from Oracle AI World, Oracle AI Database 26ai replaced Oracle Database 23ai.

What is available?

You can download now the Linux version of Oracle AI Database 26ai Enterprise Edition, 23.26.1.0.0, from the usual sources as a Gold Image include the RU or as a separate RU.

Besides the 23.26.1 database release, you can also download:

Time to upgrade 🙂

 

AutoUpgrade is your friend

People who used AutoUpgrade to download patch bundles mailed me already last Wednesday about the availability of the image on My Oracle Support. And smart folks such as Martin Berger and Christian Pfundtner blogged already on the weekend about how to download and install with complete config files.

Actually, feel free to “steal” from them – makes your life a lot easier since AutoUpgrade will build your home right away – and if needed, does the plugin, upgrade, conversion and patching operation for you.

As Christian noted on his blog, for now it is Enterprise Edition and Free Edition only.

Erik van Driessche shared also a working config file with me you may want to use as a starting point. Juist don’t forget that you need to load your MOS credentials into the Secure External Password Store (SEPS) in AutoUpgrade at first:

global.global_log_dir=/opt/ora/cfgtools/Autoupgrade
global.keystore=/opt/ora/admin/Autoupgrade26/keystore
patch1.patch=RU:23.26.1,RECOMMENDED,JDK,37393792
patch1.folder=/install/dba/Oracle_Software/26/autoupgrade_26.1
patch1.target_version=23
patch1.platform=LINUX.X64

 

eDelivery

My good friend Robert Pastijn highlighted to me that finding 23.26.1 on eDelivery isn’t as easy as it is supposed to be. You need to search explicitly with the terms ‘Oracle AI Database’ or ‘Oracle AI Database 26ai’. Searching for instance with just ‘26ai‘ or ‘23.26.1‘ does not work.

Search with “Oracle Database 26ai” will display “Oracle AI Database”

 

Or search directly with “Oracle AI Database” to find 23.26.1

 

Further Links and Information

–Mike

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33 Responses

  1. David H. says:
    January 28, 2026 at 04:49

    Is there an on-prem Standard Edition of 26ai? What’s the migration path for some on 19c SE2 today?

    Reply
  2. Mika says:
    January 28, 2026 at 09:13

    Finally! 😀

    How about support for RHEL 10?

    https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/26/ladbi/operating-system-checklist-for-oracle-database-installation-on-linux.html
    “Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.2: 5.14.0-284.30.1.el9_2.x86_64 or later
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.6: 4.18.0-372.26.1.0.1.el8_6.x86_64 or later”

    Reply
    • Mike.Dietrich says:
      January 28, 2026 at 09:16

      I’ve hard rumors that it is supposed to come – but I rather recommend that you open an SR. People mail or message me every day about it but unfortunately I have no insights into the process and the duration or where they actual are or whether they are blocked. If you raise an SR, it shows that it’s important to you 🙂

      Don’t get me wrong – but Support may know more I hope.

      Thanks,
      Mike

      Reply
      • Mika says:
        May 11, 2026 at 12:25

        Hi Mike,

        now RHEL10 is added on the list.

        “Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10: 6.12.0-55.40.1.0.1.el10_0.x86_64 or later”

        Can you confirm that 26ai is now compatible with RHEL10?

        Reply
  3. Roland says:
    January 28, 2026 at 10:03

    Hi Mike,

    there is minimal difference between the goldimage from MOS and from the oracle download page:
    – PatchSearch.xml and README.html are missing
    – inventory.xml contains a different unique_patch_id

    in fact, the MOS download from today and a week ago also is different in PatchSearch.xml

    Is there a reason for this and does it have any impact?

    Regards,
    Roland

    Reply
  4. Andreas says:
    January 28, 2026 at 10:35

    Is the reason behind the new version scheme known? I really liked . version scheme. Easy to rember and easy to explain to customers until now.

    Reply
  5. Dieter H. aus B. says:
    January 28, 2026 at 21:37

    Not funny—you pay service fees for seven years and are put off quarter after quarter.
    Then the eagerly announced version 26 finally arrives, and there’s still a 23 in front of the decimal point.
    No wonder most customers want to migrate to MS-SQL or Postgres.

    Reply
    • Mike.Dietrich says:
      January 29, 2026 at 10:16

      Hi Dieter,

      can’t follow why this would be a reason to migrate off to another vendor.
      There were so many features in 23.10 that mgmt decided to mark it with a new name (Oracle AI Database 26ai) to indicate the changes and the step-up, especially to make sure that nobody now moves to 23ai anymore.

      I understand that you may not like it, and I agree that it may be puzzling – but at the end, it should not impact you anywhere. The core database engine is still 23 – therefore, the release greats you now with 23.26.1, then 23.26.2,, 23.26.3 and 23.26.4 for this year, then 23.27.1, 23.27.2 etc for the coming year.

      Cheers,
      Mike

      Reply
    • Alexander Eßer says:
      January 29, 2026 at 16:00

      I also can’t follow this, neither I understand this rude attitude!
      Especially the last part is totally wrong, or at least miserably misleading!

      Reply
  6. OLIVIER says:
    January 29, 2026 at 11:11

    Hi Mike,

    DB/GI 23.26.1 is available on oracle.com (Gold Image) but RU 23.26.1 (neither RU 19.30 / 19c January 2026) is not listed in “Assistant: Download Reference for Oracle Database/GI Update, Revision, PSU, SPU(CPU), Bundle Patches, Patchsets and Base Releases (Doc ID 2118136.2 / KA958 )”.

    Even if 38729625 (DB RU 23.26.1) and 38729625 (GI RU 23.26.1) patches are available for download since today (download page was blank before).

    When I execute AutoUpgrade with download.cfg file, I get :

    AutoUpgrade Patching 25.6.251016 launched with default internal options
    …
    *Downloading Oracle Patch files
    Cannot find the DPBP patch

    If I removed RU:23.26.1 from config file, and I get :

    DATABASE RELEASE UPDATE 23.26.1.0.0 (GOLD IMAGE) / File: p38743961_230000_Linux-x86-64.zip – VALIDATED
    DATAPUMP BUNDLE PATCH 23.26.1.0.0 / File: p38842609_2326100DBRU_Generic.zip – VALIDATED
    JDK BUNDLE PATCH 23.26.0.0.0 / File: p38378853_230000_Linux-x86-64.zip – VALIDATED
    OPatch 12.2.0.1.49 for DB 23.0.0.0.0 (Jan 2026) / File: p6880880_230000_Linux-x86-64.zip – VALIDATED
    ORA-12850 REPORTED AFTER APPLYING DBRU ON FIRST NODE / File: p37393792_2326100DBRU_Linux-x86-64.zip – VALIDATED

    Is it normal ?

    Reply
    • Mike.Dietrich says:
      January 29, 2026 at 17:08

      Hi Oliver,

      the 19.30 is pulled for now due to an issue – it should be available hopefully by late Friday this week again.
      And to say more about your AU message, I need to see the “patch=” parameter you were using.

      Thanks,
      Mike

      Reply
  7. Nariman says:
    January 29, 2026 at 13:40

    Hi Mike,

    Thanks for the article. I noticed 1 interesting thing, when we download the 23.26.1 with autoupgrade, it’s size 2.3g, file: p38743961_230000_Linux-x86-64.zip

    However, when we download it from oracle.com. it’s size 1g only.

    Could you please shed some light, which one we should use 🙂

    Nariman

    Reply
  8. Nariman says:
    January 29, 2026 at 14:03

    Hi Mike,

    My bad, I had downloaded the GI one. Feel free to remove my comment so we dont flood the blog.

    Cheers, Nariman

    Reply
  9. Arnaud says:
    January 30, 2026 at 11:50

    I used your config file : patch1.patch=RU:23.26.1,RECOMMENDED,JDK,37393792

    Today is it working.
    Thanks.

    Reply
  10. Jörg Sobottka says:
    February 5, 2026 at 16:59

    Hi Mike

    26ai can’t be installed as a non-CDB database, but at the dbca response file I have found the non mandatory parameter createAsContainerDatabase where the default value is still FALSE – time to change that to either mandatory or default value TRUE, no? Maybe in the next RUs?

    #—————————————————————————–
    # Name : createAsContainerDatabase
    # Datatype : boolean
    # Description : flag to create database as container database
    # Valid values : Check Oracle12c Administrator’s Guide
    # Default value : false
    # Mandatory : No
    #—————————————————————————–
    createAsContainerDatabase=true

    Also in the initParams line there is now “enable_pluggable_database=true” while in 19c it was enough to set “createAsContainerDatabase=true”. I haven’t tested dbca silent yet, if this enable_pluggable_database is really needed there or enable_pluggable_database is set automatically behind the scenes because createAsContainerDatabase=true is set.

    Cheers,
    Jörg

    Reply
    • Mike.Dietrich says:
      February 9, 2026 at 15:23

      Hi Joerg,

      thank you for this finding.
      We don’t own the DBCA, and honestly, I have not much to say about it.
      You would need to open an SR since I am pretty certain that my email won’t move anything here.

      Thanks, at least this way it is documented here.

      Cheers,
      Mike

      Reply

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Mike Dietrich
Oracle Vice President of Product Management and Development for Database Upgrade, Cloud Migrations and Patching writing just another blog.

Opinions certainly are my own as is this page.

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