There are several reliable commands to identify your AIX version. The most straightforward method is using the oslevel command:

$ oslevel -s
7100-04-00-0000

The output format is VRMF-SP-YYYYMM, where:

• 7 = Version (AIX 7)
• 1 = Release (1)
• 00 = Modification
• -04- = Service Pack
• 0000 = Build date

For more detailed system information, use the lslpp command:

$ lslpp -h bos.rte
  Fileset Level  State  Description
  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Path: /usr/lib/objrepos
  bos.rte   7.1.0.4  COMMITTED  Base Operating System Runtime

To see the actual kernel version running:

$ uname -a
AIX server1 1 7 00C7C1F54C00

The key components in this output:

• AIX - Operating system name
• server1 - Hostname
• 1 - Kernel version number
• 7 - Major OS version (AIX 7)

For maintenance level details:

$ oslevel -r
7100-04

This shows the version (7), release (1), and technology level (00-04).

Here's a bash script snippet to extract and format version info:

#!/bin/bash

aix_version=$(oslevel -s | cut -d'-' -f1)
aix_release=$(oslevel -s | cut -d'-' -f2)
tech_level=$(oslevel -r)

echo "AIX Version: $aix_version"
echo "Release Level: $aix_release" 
echo "Technology Level: $tech_level"

While checking version, you might also need architecture info:

$ bootinfo -y
64

This returns either 32 or 64, indicating the kernel bitness.

---

The simplest way to check your AIX version is using the oslevel command:

oslevel -s

This will return output like 7200-04-01-1543, where:

• 7 - Major version (AIX 7)
• 2 - Minor version (7.2)
• 00-04-01-1543 - Service pack and build information

For a complete system overview, use:

prtconf | grep 'Kernel Version'

Or get all version-related info at once:

lslpp -h bos.rte

AIX uses Technology Levels for updates. Check with:

instfix -i | grep AIX_ML

Example output might show:

AIX_ML:7200-04

For scripting purposes, you might prefer:

echo "AIX Version: $(oslevel -r)"

Or parsing the output for clean version number:

oslevel -r | cut -d'-' -f1

Check kernel architecture with:

bootinfo -K

Returns 32 or 64 indicating the kernel mode.

To see available versions and compare:

oslevel -rl

This lists all supported versions in your maintenance level.

For system administrators managing multiple servers, here's a simple shell script:

#!/bin/ksh
for host in $(cat hostlist); do
    echo -n "$host: "
    ssh $host "oslevel -s 2>/dev/null"
done