The $8.8 trillion advantage: how open source software reduces IT costs 

Open source software is known for its ability to lower IT costs. But in 2025, affordability is only part of the story. A new Linux Foundation report, The strategic evolution of open source, reveals that open source has evolved from a tactical cost-saving measure to a mission-critical infrastructure supporting enterprise-grade investments, and delivering stronger business outcomes as a result.

This transformation is supported by academic research estimating that, without open source, companies would pay roughly 3.5 times more  to build the software running their businesses – an $8.8 trillion increase.[1] 

Open source: from “free alternative” to core infrastructure

The 2025 World of Open Source Survey by the Linux Foundation reveals that open source is deeply embedded across enterprise technology stacks, making it a foundation for global IT operations.  In fact, over 55% of analyzed tech stacks used a Linux-based operating system; and similarly, around half of all analyzed cloud, container, and DevOps technologies have Linux at their core.

The survey illuminates the many great reasons businesses are choosing open source: improved productivity, reduced vendor lock-in, and, unsurprisingly, lower total cost of ownership (TCO). Nearly half of organizations (46%) report an increase in business value from open source compared to last year, with 83% considering it valuable for their future. According to the World of Open Source Survey, 58% of organizations reported lower software ownership costs, and 63% cited higher productivity as a direct benefit of adopting open source. In addition, 62% reported reduced vendor lock-in and 75% judged their software quality to be higher thanks to OSS. Overall, 56% said the benefits of OSS exceeded the costs.[3] A Gartner study echoes these findings, showing that cost control and application development flexibility remain the top drivers of open source adoption.[2] 

And it’s not just about the costs: organizations that invest strategically in open source are 20% more likely to perceive competitive advantage, while 78% report workplace satisfaction and better talent attraction. Nearly 80% say open source makes their organization a better workplace, and 74% say it improves their ability to attract technical talent. 

One respondent put it this way: “Open source is not supplementary tooling but an ecosystem of core infrastructure dependencies.” This captures the shift perfectly: cost savings may start the conversation, but reliability, flexibility, and long-term value now drive adoption.

Why open source reduces IT costs and keeps cutting them

The same characteristics that make open source adaptable also make it economical:

• No per-seat licensing: organizations avoid scaling costs tied to user counts or cores
• Modular adoption: businesses can deploy only what they need, minimizing waste
• Shared innovation: security fixes, feature improvements, and bug patches benefit from collective community investment
• Interoperability and exit freedom: avoiding proprietary lock-in reduces switching costs and enables infrastructure that fits business strategy rather than the vendor’s roadmap

Systems based on open source tend to have lower maintenance overhead and longer life cycles, advantages that compound fast. That’s why enterprises see real savings,not just from shifting license costs to labor, but through genuine efficiency gains across teams.

Here’s a real-world case study of that in action: Greek telecom leader Nova leveraged Canonical’s planning and open pricing to control its CAPEX and OPEX, benefiting from predictable costs and freedom from management software licensing fees. Support from Canonical paid for “real expertise that enriches our team, rather than paying for access.”[3]

Open source is also the backbone of AI, making it easier to adopt this increasingly must-have technology into business operations. McKinsey research highlights how open source frameworks accelerate AI adoption, enable faster product development, and catalyze ecosystem innovation, amplifying the total value beyond mere cost savings.[4] In fact, the LF’s survey found that AI is the technology that benefits the most from being open source, according to 38% of respondents, and research from the Microsoft AI cloud Partners team showed that Linux environments such as Ubuntu deploy 63% faster with up to 306% ROl over three years.[5]

Mission-critical workloads demand enterprise-ready support

The data is clear: open source software lowers IT costs, but cost benefits only reach their full potential when paired with enterprise-ready support. For technical audiences, this isn’t about “just” having a backstop: it’s about operational excellence, security, and resilience. When issues do arise, they must be addressed quickly and precisely.

The survey shows 71% of organizations expect response times under 12 hours for critical OSS production issues, marking a shift from traditional community support to commercial-grade service-level agreements. In financial services and manufacturing, over 90% consider paid OSS support essential. This need for enterprise-grade support peaks in mission-critical workloads (54%), systems handling sensitive data (43%), and regulated sectors (38%).

There’s a perception that support is ‘too expensive’, but quite to the contrary, paid commercial support does not diminish open source’s cost benefits; instead, it enhances them. Just like OSS adoption saves on costs and licences, robust support services protect organizations against the potentially disastrous costs of downtime, compliance failures, or data breaches. 

Canonical’s own experience confirms that long-term OSS support is an increasingly strategic investment, especially in markets with high regulatory demands and cloud migration complexities.[6]

Take, for example, The European Space Agency (ESA), which depends on Canonical’s distributions of Kubeflow and Spark running on Kubernetes for its mission operations. ESA highlights that Canonical’s support lets them “sleep soundly,” focusing on space missions while trusting infrastructure experts for uptime and reliability.[3]

How Ubuntu Pro locks in the value of open source

The biggest IT cost benefits of open source software come when free software innovation is combined with investments in professional support. After all, these low-cost (or sometimes free) tools are highly accessible and often intuitive to build with, but they can take a lot of time, effort, and specialized skills to maintain and secure in the long term.

Canonical takes away that time-consuming effort from developers, and allows them to focus on building, through Ubuntu Pro + Support, our comprehensive security maintenance and support service.

 Ubuntu Pro + Support gives users a wide range of benefits, including:

• Up to 15 years of security maintenance and support covering thousands of open source components from the kernel to the applications layer.
• Compliance-ready patching for mission-critical, regulated, and sensitive workloads.
• Predictable enterprise SLAs aligned with the sub–12-hour incident response expectations of 71% of organizations.
• Transparent, forecastable total cost of ownership, eliminating license uncertainties.

Ubuntu Pro extends cost benefits beyond licensing into comprehensive lifecycle management, turning open source affordability into sustained business value.

Open source is an economic strategy, not a shortcut

In conclusion, the business benefits of open source are clear to see, and widely reflected in the business landscape, where record numbers of organizations and tech stacks have open source as a core part of their mission-critical systems. The permissive licences, lack of vendor lock-in, and flexibility of open source make it a clear cost optimizer; but the most significant IT cost savings emerge when organizations combine free software innovation with enterprise-grade support, governance, and active engagement. Those who treat open source as core infrastructure aren’t just saving money: they’re building competitive, secure, and innovative foundations for growth.

$8.8 trillion – that’s what open source is worth to the global economy. If you’re not building on it, you’re paying for it somewhere else. The organizations leading in innovation, efficiency, and resilience already know: open source is the foundation of competitive advantage.

Sources

1. Open Source Software: The $9 Trillion Resource Companies Take for Granted, HBS
2. Top challenges to using Open-source for product and application development, Gartner
3. What’s the state of open source adoption in Europe?, Ubuntu blog
4. Open source technology in the age of AI, McKinsey
5. IDC Business Value Study: A 306% ROI within 3 years using Ubuntu Linux on Azure, Microsoft Azure
6. 54% of European enterprises want long term open source support: how Ubuntu Pro + Support delivers, Ubuntu blog
7. The value of open source software is more than cost savings, Linux Foundation