Oracle Linux requires one partition for the root file system. Further, two other partitions are typically reserved for swap space and the boot file system. On x86 and x86_64 systems, the system BIOS can access only the first 1024 cylinders of the disk at boot time. Configuring a separate boot partition in this region on the disk enables the GRUB bootloader to access the kernel image and other files that are required to boot the system.

For hard disks with a master boot record (MBR), the partitioning scheme supports up to 4 primary partitions. In turn, a primary partition can further be divided into up to 11 logical partitions. The primary partition that contains the logical partitions is known as an extended partition. The MBR scheme supports disks up to 2 TB in size.

On hard disks with a GUID Partition Table (GPT), you can configure up to 128 partitions. The GPT partition scheme doesn't use the concept of extended or logical partitions. If the disk's size is larger than 2 TB, use GPT to configure the device's partitions.