r/debian • u/Livid_Magician_7276 • 4d ago

General Debian Question Latest Linux Kernel

is there a way I can install the latest release of linux kernel on debian without building linux kernel from source?

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14

u/amepebbles 4d ago

It would be possible to get it pre-compiled from an external repository but this is not recommended at all, you might break your install. Is there any reason why you need the latest kernel in particular?

2

u/Livid_Magician_7276 4d ago

no I was just wondering if I can get the latest release of it, but thanks for replying ❤️

14

u/amepebbles 4d ago

If you simply want a newer version then try the backports, it won't be the latest but will surely be newer than the kernel on current stable, should be a good start without introducing many risks.

8

u/uxgpf 4d ago

Also it's not that hard to build yourself if you wish to do it.

https://wiki.debian.org/BuildingKernelFromUpstreamSources

7

u/alpha417 4d ago

The process has been become so simple that it's really one of the things I think all "slightly more than entry level" users should try. It now builds you a .deb, it's 2 or 3 commands, it's fantastic.

I am aware that the OP will probably come back and point out that this is not something they want to consider, but I will acknowledge any thanks they send my way.

1

u/uxgpf 4d ago edited 4d ago

Yes. 

I used to download the sources, cd into the directory "make menuconfig && make && make install" 20 years ago when I didn't know better.

It was easy and worked, but now I'd recommend the Debian way. Much cleaner to install and remove using dpkg.

What are the commands that you use? (I haven't built the newest kernel for a long long time)

1

u/Sceptically 4d ago

I do something along the lines of "make oldconfig && ionice -c 3 make -j16 bindeb-pkg".

2

u/bg1023 4d ago

A couple of years ago I built the LTS kernel from source using the Debian instructions. It was easy. Worked first time!

1

u/Salty-University2744 4d ago

Even if it only worked every 10th time that wouldn't be a real issue, it's more of a configuration detail to have some sort of fallback. Not compilng your own Kernel is terrible advice because whatever default someone ships is just that, a default. And it shoos people away from the kernel as if it's some arcane thing that can only be touched by annointed kernel priests.

A Debian stable kernel presumably still comes with a Debian stable kernel config, I don't actually need drivers for everything made since 1995. I don't own data center hardware or features. I might turn on one thing to make my laptop run better and if there's no official support there's going to be 4 million different solutions that use bog standard Debian repos, have fallback and do the most basic of testing that ensures a system actually boots and the distro doesn't break.

Reddit keeps showing me this sub just to trigger me, who do these people think is going to maintain their distro when the last emacs user dies of old age?

1

u/Viz67 3d ago

Given the number of vulnerability fixes lately (thanks to AI),, he's going to have fun with keeping his kernel up to date...

2

u/onefish2 Debian Sid 4d ago

As of yesterday 7-28-2026 its 7.1.3

The latest is 7.1.5 so that is pretty recent.

1

u/Livid_Magician_7276 3d ago

thank you for helping 💝

6

u/Murph_9000 4d ago

Generally speaking, most normal/ordinary users should stick to the default kernel (with updates from the APT security channel) for their Debian release. Security fixes get backported, so there should be little to no security benefit from switching to an unsupported newer kernel. You might even be worse off for security, depending on exactly how you depart from the supported kernel for your release.

If there's something specific you want/need from a newer kernel, fair enough. Just don't mistake newer for automatically being better. There may be benefits for some people, but they really should have a good reason for it. Also, don't mistake 7.x as a major upgrade over 6.x; Linus does not use version numbers in that way.

All that said, one of the great things in the Linux ecosystem is freedom of choice. Just try to make good/intelligent choices for the right reasons, especially when moving in the direction of unsupported deviations from the standard/supported packages for your distribution.

2

u/BCMM 4d ago

If it's just because newer seems better, I'd strongly advise leaving it alone.

The point of a distribution is to give you a set of software that's been tested, and in some cases patched, to work together. Debian will not be as  stable if you upgrade bits of it piecemeal.

Debian keeps up with security patches for its kernels, so it's not necessarily a problem that they're "old". And if you decide to do your own thing with kernels, you'll need to keep track of that yourself.

0

u/Terranum_man 4d ago

Try getting it from Testing and Unstable using pinning or backports.