If the release number of your current Oracle Database appears in the following list, you can use DBUA to perform a direct upgrade of your database to Oracle Database 12c Release 1 (12.1):
11.2.0.2 or later
11.1.0.7
10.2.0.4 or earlier
If your current Oracle Database is a release earlier than 10.2.0.4, or is release 11.2.0.1, then directly upgrading your current release of Oracle Database to the latest release is not supported. In this case, you must upgrade to an intermediate release before upgrading to the new Oracle Database 12c release.
See Also:
Oracle Database Upgrade Guide for more information on upgrading your Oracle Database if a direct upgrade to the new Oracle Database 12c release is not supported.