.rpm File — Red Hat Package Manager

RPM (Red Hat Package Manager, now recursively RPM Package Manager) is the package format used by Red Hat-based Linux distributions including RHEL, Fedora, CentOS, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux, openSUSE, and Amazon Linux. An RPM file contains a binary header with package metadata (name, version, dependencies, checksums, file lists), followed by a cpio archive compressed with gzip, bzip2, xz, or zstd containing the actual installation files. RPM packages are managed by the rpm tool (low-level) and yum/dnf (high-level with dependency resolution and repository management). The format supports digital signatures (GPG) for package authentication, scriptlets for pre/post installation actions, file triggers, rich dependencies, and weak dependencies. RPM packages can be built using rpmbuild with spec files that describe the build process, or with tools like fpm for simpler packaging needs. The RPM ecosystem powers some of the most critical enterprise Linux deployments worldwide, with Red Hat's repositories containing thousands of maintained packages. Source RPMs (SRPMs) include source code and build instructions for reproducible package building.