Overview

Images for Raspberry 3+ are built as part of the Debian cloud image build and are available under https://cloud.debian.org/images/cloud/

/!\ Raspberry Pi 5 is only supported in upcoming Debian forky (debian-14-raspi-arm64 or in current sid).

More info in https://raspi.debian.net/ - please go there if you have trouble with the following instructions!

Installation Using Daily images

Download the image for your desired Debian version from above. Ensure the shasum in the SHA512SUMS file in the same directory matches your download.

Now, write the image to your SD card! Make sure $SD_CARD (e.g, SD_CARD = /dev/sdb) is right! (you risk losing information otherwise!)

tar x --to-stdout -f debian-13-raspi-arm64-daily.tar.xz | sudo su -c 'pv > $SD_CARD'

or

tar -xOf debian-14-raspi-arm64-daily.tar.xz | sudo dd of=$SD_CARD bs=4M status=progress conv=fsync

Wait until the command returns and eject the sdcard. Now you should be able to boot your Raspberry if the firmware is halfway current.

Alternative Installation using Raspberry Pi Imager

You can use the Raspberry Pi Imager to flash daily builds onto your SD card. please follow these specific steps:

1. Extract the Archive: First, manually extract the .tar.xz file on your computer to locate the disk.raw file inside.

2. Select Custom Image: Open the Raspberry Pi Imager, click on CHOOSE OS, and select the Use Custom option at the bottom of the list.

3. Find the Raw Image: When the file explorer opens, change the file filter to All Files so you can see and select the extracted disk.raw (or you can rename from disk.raw to disk.img) file.

Build your own Raspberry Pi Debian-based image

As an alternative to using a pre-built image, you can build and customize one yourself. Instructions on how to do this can be found here!.

Alternative Debian-based image building or installation

You may use this other shell script to create SD card images for all RPi models or perform an install straight to the SD card, from another running GNU/Linux machine.

This avoids problems with things like preset passwords, machine IDs, lack of random bytes/entropy, …

Post-installation

Set a root password

The built images are shipped with a *passwordless root*, which means, you can log in as root as long as you do it locally (either via a serial console or using a USB keyboard). You are encouraged to set a root password as early as possible!.

Remote SSH login

In order to log in remotely, create a non-root user; this user will be able to log in via ssh.

Update

You can update your installation using regular Debian commands (providing you have network access):

# apt update && apt upgrade 

When there is a new kernel, it will be upgraded too (tested with the Pi4 image), and the file /boot/firmware/config.txt will be edited automatically to reflect the change. You can simply reboot to activate it. :-)

The provided images use a very minimal installation. You may find it useful to run the following command to install some standard packages:

# tasksel install --new-install standard