If Linux kernel 4.8 will be a normal release with a total of seven RCs, and it’ll be announced on day of September 25, then the development cycle of the Linux 4.9 kernel should start with the first Release Candidate development snapshot on October 9, 2016. But if Linux kernel 4.8 will have eight RCs, then we should see Linux kernel 4.9 LTS RC1 one week later, on October 16. Therefore, the final release of Linux kernel 4.9 LTS should hit the streets at the end of November 2016. By then, many GNU/Linux distributions will have new versions, and among the most popular ones we can mention Fedora 25 and Ubuntu 16.10 (Yakkety Yak).