Debian is one of the oldest and most influential Linux distributions, an independent project run by volunteers under a written social contract. It packages tens of thousands of pieces of software in the deb format, managed by APT, and its archive feeds an entire family of descendants that includes Ubuntu and, through it, hundreds of further derivatives. Debian maintains three main branches: stable, prized on servers because packages change only for security and serious bugs; testing, a preview of the next release; and unstable, where development happens. New stable releases appear roughly every two years and carry Toy Story character names. Installer images offer a choice of desktops, with GNOME, KDE Plasma, Xfce, and others supported, and the project builds for many processor architectures. Stability is the trait people cite first. Booting plain Debian in an OpenFactory browser VM takes minutes and requires no spare hardware.
Select a version of Debian to try online:
| Current: | |
|---|---|
| 13.0.0: | |
| 13: | |
| 12.10.0: | |
| 12.5.0: | |
| 12.0.0: | |
| 12: | |
| 11.9.0: | |
| 11.0.0: | |
| 11: | |
| 10.13.0: | |
| 10.0.0: |
Need Debian for more than a quick browser preview?
The buttons above launch an ephemeral browser VM, perfect for kicking the tires. Paid plans unlock the things you'd actually use it for:
- ✓Persistent VMs you can SSH into and customize
- ✓Snapshots, your own packages, a downloadable ISO
- ✓Fleet deployment to your own machines (on-prem or cloud)