Installation guide

This document is a guide for installing Arch Linux using the live system booted from an
installation medium made from an official installation image. The installation medium
provides accessibility features which are described on the page Install Arch Linux with
accessibility options. For alternative means of installation, see Category:Installation
process.

Before installing, it would be advised to view the FAQ. For conventions used in this
document, see Help:Reading. In particular, code examples may contain placeholders
(formatted in italics ) that must be replaced manually.

This guide is kept concise and you are advised to follow the instructions in the presented
order per section. For more detailed instructions, see the respective ArchWiki articles or
the various programs' man pages, both linked from this guide. For interactive help, the IRC
channel and the forums (https://bbs.archlinux.org/) are also available.

Arch Linux should run on any x86_64-compatible machine with a minimum of 512 MiB
RAM, though more memory is needed to boot the live system for installation.[1] (https://lis
ts.archlinux.org/archives/list/[email protected]/message/D5HSGOFTPG
YI6IZUEB3ZNAX4D3F3ID37/) A basic installation should take less than 2 GiB of disk space.
As the installation process needs to retrieve packages from a remote repository, this guide
assumes a working internet connection is available.

1 Pre-installation

1.1 Acquire an installation image

Visit the Download (https://archlinux.org/download/) page and, depending on how you
want to boot, acquire the ISO file or a netboot image, and the respective GnuPG signature.

1.2 Verify signature

It is recommended to verify the image signature before use, especially when downloading
from an HTTP mirror, where downloads are generally prone to be intercepted to serve
malicious images (https://www2.cs.arizona.edu/stork/packagemanagersecurity/attack
s-on-package-managers.html).

On a system with GnuPG installed, do this by downloading the ISO PGP signature (under
Checksums in the page Download (https://archlinux.org/download/#checksums)) to the
ISO directory, and verifying it with:

$ gpg --keyserver-options auto-key-retrieve --verify archlinux-version-x86_64.iso.sig

Alternatively, from an existing Arch Linux installation run:

$ pacman-key -v archlinux-version-x86_64.iso.sig
 Note:
The signature itself could be manipulated if it is downloaded from a mirror site, instead of
from archlinux.org (https://archlinux.org/download/) as above. In this case, ensure that the
public key, which is used to decode the signature, is signed by another, trustworthy key. The
gpg command will output the fingerprint of the public key.
Another method to verify the authenticity of the signature is to ensure that the public key's
fingerprint is identical to the key fingerprint of the Arch Linux developer (https://archlinux.or
g/people/developers/) who signed the ISO-file. See Wikipedia:Public-key cryptography for
more information on the public-key process to authenticate keys.

1.3 Prepare an installation medium

The ISO can be supplied to the target machine via a USB flash drive, an optical disc or a
network with PXE: follow the appropriate article to prepare yourself an installation
medium from the ISO file.

For the netboot image, follow Netboot#Boot from a USB flash drive to prepare a USB
flash drive for UEFI booting.

1.4 Boot the live environment

Note: Arch Linux installation images do not support Secure Boot. You will need to
disable Secure Boot to boot the installation medium. If desired, Secure Boot can be set
up after completing the installation.

1. Point the current boot device to the one which has the Arch Linux installation medium.
Typically it is achieved by pressing a key during the POST phase, as indicated on the splash
screen. Refer to your motherboard's manual for details.
2. When the installation medium's boot loader menu appears,
if you used the ISO, select Arch Linux install medium and press Enter to enter the
installation environment.
if you used the Netboot image, choose a geographically close mirror from Mirror menu,
then select Boot Arch Linux and press Enter .

Tip:
The ISO uses systemd-boot for UEFI and syslinux for BIOS booting. Use respectively
e or Tab to enter the boot parameters. The Netboot image uses iPXE and the boot
parameters can be specified in the Boot options menu. See README.bootparams (ht
tps://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/mkinitcpio/mkinitcpio-archiso/blob/master/doc
s/README.bootparams) for a list.
A common example of manually defined boot parameter would be the font size. For
better readability on HiDPI screens—when they are not already recognized as such—
using fbcon=font:TER16x32 can help. See HiDPI#Linux console (tty) for a
detailed explanation.

3.
4. You will be logged in on the first virtual console as the root user, and presented with a Zsh
shell prompt.
To switch to a different console—for example, to view this guide with Lynx (https://lynx.in
visible-island.net/lynx_help/Lynx_users_guide.html) alongside the installation—use the
Alt+arrow shortcut. To edit configuration files, mcedit(1) (https://man.archlinu
x.org/man/mcedit.1), nano and vim are available. See pkglist.x86_64.txt (https://geo.m
irror.pkgbuild.com/iso/latest/arch/pkglist.x86_64.txt) for a list of the packages included
in the installation medium.

1.5 Set the console keyboard layout and font

The default console keymap is US. Available layouts can be listed with:

# localectl list-keymaps

To set the keyboard layout, pass its name to loadkeys(1) (https://man.archlinux.or

g/man/loadkeys.1). For example, to set a German keyboard layout:

# loadkeys de-latin1

Console fonts are located in /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ and can likewise be set

with setfont(8) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/setfont.8) omitting the path
and file extension. For example, to use one of the largest fonts suitable for HiDPI screens,
run:

# setfont ter-132b

1.6 Verify the boot mode

To verify the boot mode, check the UEFI bitness:

# cat /sys/firmware/efi/fw_platform_size

If the command returns 64 , then system is booted in UEFI mode and has a 64-bit x64 UEFI.
If the command returns 32 , then system is booted in UEFI mode and has a 32-bit IA32
UEFI; while this is supported, it will limit the boot loader choice to systemd-boot and GRUB.
If the file does not exist, the system may be booted in BIOS (or CSM) mode. If the system
did not boot in the mode you desired (UEFI vs BIOS), refer to your motherboard's manual.

1.7 Connect to the internet

To set up a network connection in the live environment, go through the following steps:

Ensure your network interface is listed and enabled, for example with ip-link(8) (http
s://man.archlinux.org/man/ip-link.8):
# ip link

For wireless and WWAN, make sure the card is not blocked with rfkill.
Connect to the network:
Ethernet—plug in the cable.
Wi-Fi—authenticate to the wireless network using iwctl.
 Mobile broadband modem—connect to the mobile network with the mmcli utility.
Configure your network connection:
DHCP: dynamic IP address and DNS server assignment (provided by systemd-networkd
and systemd-resolved) should work out of the box for Ethernet, WLAN, and WWAN
network interfaces.
Static IP address: follow Network configuration#Static IP address.
The connection may be verified with ping:
# ping archlinux.org

Note: In the installation image, systemd-networkd, systemd-resolved, iwd and

ModemManager are preconfigured and enabled by default. That will not be the case for
the installed system.

1.8 Update the system clock

In the live environment systemd-timesyncd is enabled by default and time will be synced
automatically once a connection to the internet is established.

Use timedatectl(1) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/timedatectl.1) to ensure

the system clock is synchronized:

# timedatectl

1.9 Partition the disks

When recognized by the live system, disks are assigned to a block device such as
/dev/sda , /dev/nvme0n1 or /dev/mmcblk0 . To identify these devices, use lsblk or
fdisk.

# fdisk -l

Results ending in rom , loop or airootfs may be ignored. mmcblk* devices ending in
rpbm , boot0 and boot1 can be ignored.

Note: If the disk does not show up, make sure the disk controller is not in RAID mode.

Tip: Check that your NVMe drives and Advanced Format hard disk drives are using the
optimal logical sector size before partitioning.

The following partitions are required for a chosen device:

One partition for the root directory / .

For booting in UEFI mode: an EFI system partition.
Use a partitioning tool like fdisk to modify partition tables. For example:

# fdisk /dev/the_disk_to_be_partitioned
 Note:
Take time to plan a long-term partitioning scheme to avoid risky and complicated
conversion or re-partitioning procedures in the future.
If you want to create any stacked block devices for LVM, system encryption or RAID, do it
now.
If the disk from which you want to boot already has an EFI system partition, do not create
another one, but use the existing partition instead.
Swap space can be set on a swap file for file systems supporting it. Alternatively, disk based
swap can be avoided entirely by setting up swap on zram after installing the system.

1.9.1 Example layouts

UEFI with GPT
Mount point on the
Partition Partition type Suggested size
installed system

EFI system
/boot 1 /dev/efi_system_partition
partition
1 GiB

[SWAP] /dev/swap_partition Linux swap At least 4 GiB

Linux x86-64 Remainder of the device. At

/ /dev/root_partition
root (/) least 23–32 GiB.

1. Other mount points, such as /efi , are possible, provided that the used boot loader is
capable of loading the kernel and initramfs images from the root volume. See the warning in
Arch boot process#Boot loader.

BIOS with MBR

Mount point on the installed Partition
Partition Suggested size
system type

[SWAP] /dev/swap_partition Linux swap At least 4 GiB

Remainder of the device. At least

/ /dev/root_partition Linux
23–32 GiB.

See also Partitioning#Example layouts.

1.10 Format the partitions

Once the partitions have been created, each newly created partition must be formatted
with an appropriate file system. See File systems#Create a file system for details.

For example, to create an Ext4 file system on /dev/root_partition , run:

# mkfs.ext4 /dev/root_partition

If you created a partition for swap, initialize it with mkswap(8) (https://man.archlinu

x.org/man/mkswap.8):

# mkswap /dev/swap_partition
 Note: For stacked block devices replace /dev/*_partition with the appropriate block
device path.

If you created an EFI system partition, format it to FAT32 using mkfs.fat(8) (https://
man.archlinux.org/man/mkfs.fat.8).

Warning: Only format the EFI system partition if you created it during the partitioning
step. If there already was an EFI system partition on disk beforehand, reformatting it can
destroy the boot loaders of other installed operating systems.

# mkfs.fat -F 32 /dev/efi_system_partition

1.11 Mount the file systems

Mount the root volume to /mnt . For example, if the root volume is
/dev/root_partition :

# mount /dev/root_partition /mnt

Create any remaining mount points under /mnt (such as /mnt/boot for /boot ) and
mount the volumes in their corresponding hierarchical order.

Tip: Run mount(8) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/mount.8) with the

--mkdir option to create the specified mount point. Alternatively, create it using
mkdir(1) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/mkdir.1) beforehand.
For UEFI systems, mount the EFI system partition:

# mount --mkdir /dev/efi_system_partition /mnt/boot

If you created a swap volume, enable it with swapon(8) (https://man.archlinux.or

g/man/swapon.8):

# swapon /dev/swap_partition

genfstab(8) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/genfstab.8) will later detect

mounted file systems and swap space.

2 Installation

2.1 Select the mirrors

Packages to be installed must be downloaded from mirror servers, which are defined in
/etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist . On the live system, after connecting to the internet,
reflector updates the mirror list by choosing 20 most recently synchronized HTTPS
mirrors and sorting them by download rate.
The higher a mirror is placed in the list, the more priority it is given when downloading a
package. You may want to inspect the file to see if it is satisfactory. If it is not, edit the file
accordingly, and move the geographically closest mirrors to the top of the list, although
other criteria should be taken into account.

This file will later be copied to the new system by pacstrap, so it is worth getting right.

2.2 Install essential packages

Note: No software or configuration (except for /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist ) gets
carried over from the live environment to the installed system.

Use the pacstrap(8) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/pacstrap.8) script to install

the base (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=base) package, Linux kernel
and firmware for common hardware:

# pacstrap -K /mnt base linux linux-firmware

Tip:
You can substitute linux (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=linux) with
a kernel package of your choice, or you could omit it entirely when installing in a container.
You could omit the installation of the firmware package when installing in a virtual machine
or container.

The base (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=base) package does not include

all tools from the live installation, so installing more packages may be necessary for a fully
functional base system. To install other packages or package groups, append the names to
the pacstrap command above (space separated) or use pacman to install them while
chrooted into the new system. In particular, consider installing:

CPU microcode updates—amd-ucode (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=am

d-ucode) or intel-ucode (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=intel-uco
de)—for hardware bug and security fixes,
userspace utilities for file systems that will be used on the system—for the purposes of e.g.
file system creation and fsck,
utilities for accessing and managing RAID or LVM if they will be used on the system,
specific firmware for other devices not included in linux-firmware (https://archlinu
x.org/packages/?name=linux-firmware) (e.g. sof-firmware (https://archlin
ux.org/packages/?name=sof-firmware) for onboard audio, linux-firmware-
marvell (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=linux-firmware-marvell)
for Marvell wireless and any of the multiple firmware packages for Broadcom wireless),
software necessary for networking (e.g. a network manager or a standalone DHCP client,
authentication software for Wi-Fi, ModemManager for mobile broadband connections),
a console text editor (e.g nano) to allow editing configuration files from the console,
packages for accessing documentation in man and info pages: man-db (https://archlin
ux.org/packages/?name=man-db), man-pages (https://archlinux.org/package
s/?name=man-pages) and texinfo (https://archlinux.org/packages/?name=te
xinfo).
For comparison, packages available in the live system can be found in pkglist.x86_64.txt
(https://geo.mirror.pkgbuild.com/iso/latest/arch/pkglist.x86_64.txt).

3 Configure the system

3.1 Fstab
Generate an fstab file (use -U or -L to define by UUID or labels, respectively):

# genfstab -U /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Check the resulting /mnt/etc/fstab file, and edit it in case of errors.

3.2 Chroot
Change root into the new system:

# arch-chroot /mnt

3.3 Time
Set the time zone:

# ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Region/City /etc/localtime

Run hwclock(8) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/hwclock.8) to generate

/etc/adjtime :

# hwclock --systohc

This command assumes the hardware clock is set to UTC. See System time#Time standard
for details.

To prevent clock drift and ensure accurate time, set up time synchronization using a
Network Time Protocol (NTP) client such as systemd-timesyncd.

3.4 Localization
Edit /etc/locale.gen and uncomment en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8 and other needed UTF-8
locales. Generate the locales by running:

# locale-gen

Create the locale.conf(5) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/locale.conf.5) file,

and set the LANG variable accordingly:

/etc/locale.conf

LANG=en_US.UTF-8
If you set the console keyboard layout, make the changes
persistent in
vconsole.conf(5) (https://man.archlinux.org/man/vconsole.conf.5):

/etc/vconsole.conf

KEYMAP=de-latin1

3.5 Network configuration

Create the hostname file:

/etc/hostname

yourhostname

Complete the network configuration for the newly installed environment. That may
include installing suitable network management software, configuring it if necessary and
enabling its systemd unit so that it starts at boot.

3.6 Initramfs
Creating a new initramfs is usually not required, because mkinitcpio was run on
installation of the kernel package with pacstrap.

For LVM, system encryption or RAID, modify mkinitcpio.conf(5) (https://man.arc

hlinux.org/man/mkinitcpio.conf.5) and recreate the initramfs image:

# mkinitcpio -P

3.7 Root password

Set the root password:

# passwd

3.8 Boot loader

Choose and install a Linux-capable boot loader.

4 Reboot
Exit the chroot environment by typing exit or pressing Ctrl+d .

Optionally manually unmount all the partitions with umount -R /mnt : this allows
noticing any "busy" partitions, and finding the cause with fuser(1) (https://man.arch
linux.org/man/fuser.1).
Finally, restart the machine by typing reboot : any partitions still mounted will be
automatically unmounted by systemd. Remember to remove the installation medium and
then login into the new system with the root account.

5 Post-installation
See General recommendations for system management directions and post-installation
tutorials (like creating unprivileged user accounts, setting up a graphical user interface,
sound or a touchpad).

For a list of applications that may be of interest, see List of applications.

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