Version
If you are using R, you can check the version by running the command
R --version
in your terminal.
About R
R is a programming language and free software environment for statistical computing and graphics supported by the
R Foundation for Statistical Computing.
R is an extremely useful programming language in its own right, many have adopted it for data science purposes,
but it also has powerful features such as the R Markdown capabilities,
as well as extremely powerful data frame manipulation, data processing, .csv and .xlsx file handling, as well
as a huge number of libraries that can suit the needs from the most basic beginner looking to get started with
data science and R programming to the most advanced programmer looking to analyze big chunks of data for
a professional purpose. R is commonly used together with the RStudio IDE, now developed by Posit.
R has a big number of applications, but they are mostly in the data science space.
Nevertheless, popular libraries have made it extremely powerful in running simulations, displaying graphical
data,
and other powerful features. R has applications in bioengineering, machine learning, and many other data-driven
fields.
It has become extremely popular with data analysts in all businesses and industries
because it allows a seasoned programmer to extract a lot more insight and helpful visualizations of data
than other programming languages and adapting libraries. As such, people from regular developers,
to business analysts, to even committed manager-level employees are learning some level of R to generate
value through the data that a corporation is able to obtain.
This language has a number of characteristics and features that make it stand out from the rest
and become the data-science, statistically-oriented language almost everyone turns to when in need of a similar
task.
First, R allows you to run code without a compiler, making the development of code easier.
Second, R has the big advantage of being a vector language, meaning operations with matrices
and vectors can be done extremely easily, without the need to implement loops like with other languages.
Another very handy fact is that R has a very active development community,
meaning you can easily seek out help from forums and constantly get new libraries and updates
that can help you with your projects.
Releases
Currently, R is on the stable release 4.6.1 ("Happy Hop"), published on 24th June 2026; the yearly 4.6.0 release came out on 24th April 2026.
R is updated mostly on a yearly basis, with sometimes slight bug fixes coming through from the official team.
R publishes one x.y.0 release every spring (4.5.0 in April 2025, 4.6.0 in April 2026) with patch releases in between; R 4.7.0 is expected in spring 2027.