How to Upgrade Raspberry Pi OS from Bookworm to Trixie

The new Raspberry Pi OS version (codename “Trixie”) is now officially available. While it’s recommended to install a new version fresh, it’s still possible to try an upgrade an existing installation on non-critical systems. Let’s discuss your options here.

As a general rule, it’s always risky to upgrade from one major version to the next without reinstalling. Knowing this, it’s still possible to try it, by updating the sources.list file of the APT package manager.

I’ve tried it, and I can share my experience with you in this article. Let’s first discuss why it’s not recommended, and then see how to do it if you are not too worried about the results.

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Should You Upgrade Raspberry Pi OS from Bookworm to Trixie?

While progressively migrating your Raspberry Pi devices to Trixie is a good idea, upgrading them directly from an older version to the latest one is not recommended, and probably not even necessary.

Do You Really Need to Upgrade to Trixie?

Debian and the Raspberry Pi Foundation will continue releasing security updates for your devices running on Bookworm for a while (at least for as long as it’s available as a “Legacy” option in Raspberry Pi Imager).

So, there is no rush. You have the time to install a clean new version on a new SD card or SSD drive, and migrate your applications there step-by-step.

With the release of the Raspberry Pi 500+, it’s a great time to get this brand-new model to replace your existing setup, install Trixie on it, and migrate your applications progressively.

General Rule

The general rule, when a new Debian or Raspberry Pi OS version is released, is to install it from scratch, then add the applications, and migrate the configuration and data from the previous system. This is the recommended way to do it.

It doesn’t mean you can’t upgrade directly; it’s just the safest way to do it. It allows you to go slowly, test, and make sure everything is OK.

When I was a system administrator, I did a major upgrade several times on Debian servers, and it worked pretty well. You have to be willing to deal with bugs depending on the applications you use, but sometimes that situation is better than having long downtimes.

So I know there can be a difference between the “best practice” and what you’ll really do.

Anyway, in this case, the Raspberry Pi Foundation clearly discourages us from trying it. There are many changes in the background (display, audio and network management), that make this procedure even more risky than usual.

As with all major version upgrades, we do not recommend or support attempting to upgrade a running Bookworm image. […] We know some people will nonetheless insist that they have to do this; we strongly suggest you don’t… You do this at your own risk, and you shouldn’t even consider it without having backed up first — you have been warned!

Simon Long – Software Engineer / Raspberry Pi

My advice here would be to do a fresh install if possible (99% of cases). And if it’s really not possible, or you think it will take too long, do a full backup of your existing system, and try the upgrade on a separate device, just to see how it goes.

My Experience

I did the test on two different setups, so you don’t have to. Here are my results.

With a Desktop Environment

In my experience, upgrading a desktop version of Raspberry Pi OS from Bookworm to Trixie is not a good idea. Even if it looks good at first glance, there are many underlying bugs in the background.

After the first reboot, it seemed “OK” in my tests. But as soon as I started using the interface, I noticed some weird issues. It works, but some things might need extra work to run properly.

Depending on how you use your system, and if your existing applications continue to work or not, it’s not necessarily that bad. But expect to have issues after a release upgrade anyway.

You’ll have to consider the time saved by not reinstalling your existing apps vs the time lost with problems like that and future incompatibilities. In my opinion, it’s not worth the try.

Problems with future updates are what really scare me, to be honest. Even if it doesn’t seem so bad currently, I’m sure it will only become worse with time and new application updates.

In short, don’t try to upgrade an existing Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm installation to Trixie directly. Installing a fresh version of Trixie Desktop on a new media storage is highly recommended.

For a Lite Installation

I also tested a Lite installation, where many changes coming with Trixie are less significant: no display so graphical configurations aren’t an issue, no audio in general, Wi-Fi not necessarily used, etc.

In the case of a server running Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm, I think it is way more possible to do the upgrade to Trixie directly. You still need to take precautions (backups), but it’s doable.

It worked well in my tests. But to be honest, it was a fresh installation, without a ton of servers and apps running, so I can’t promise it will work smoothly for you.

Anyway, I think it’s smarter to try it for a server. As it’s always a headache to reinstall many servers from scratch, you can try to duplicate your SD card and upgrade it to see how it goes. If it’s not that bad, it might save you a lot of time.

Disclaimer: While you can follow the steps listed in the next section to upgrade Raspberry Pi OS to the latest version, you do so at your own risk. Chances are that some packages will no longer work. You may also lose configurations or personal data in the process, so make sure you have a full backup of your system first.

How to Upgrade Raspberry Pi OS to Trixie

As mentioned in the introduction, we use APT to update all the packages on the system (either directly or with a graphical tool intermediate). APT checks for new updates available on the repositories and suggests installation.

The easiest way to upgrade your system to a new version is to change the repositories used by APT.

So, start by opening a terminal.
You can do this via a GUI (Graphical User Interface), on Raspberry Pi OS Lite or even via an SSH connection, it doesn’t matter.

Preparing the System

Start by updating your system with the current repositories; you want the most current version of packages in your existing release before upgrading everything to the new release:
sudo apt update
sudo apt full-upgrade

Reboot the Raspberry Pi if there were many updates:
sudo reboot

Changing Repository Sources

Next, we’ll change the repositories so that they’ll pull from the latest Raspberry Pi OS release:

• Open the sources.list file with:
  sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list
  (You can find my complete Nano guide with the commands and shortcuts here.)
• You’ll see one or more lines like this:
  deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bookworm main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
• Edit these lines to replace the code name with the release you want to install, for example:
  deb http://deb.debian.org/debian trixie main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
• If there are several lines, change all of them the same way (trixie-security, trixie-updates, etc.).
  
• Save and exit (CTRL+X, Y, ENTER).

Let’s repeat the same steps for the files in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/:

• There should only be one file in there by default, so let’s open it:
  sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list.d/raspi.list
• Edit the line to replace with the code name of the release you want:
  deb http://archive.raspberrypi.com/debian/ trixie main
  
• Save and exit (CTRL+X, Y, ENTER).
• Repeat this step for any custom files you’ve put in the /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ folder.

Upgrading Packages to Trixie

Then, we can upgrade your system using the new sources:

• Refresh the package lists:
  sudo apt update
  
  As you can see, all the URLs now say “trixie” instead of “bookworm”.
• Before installing anything new, let’s remove some old Bookworm stuff:
  sudo apt purge raspberrypi-ui-mods
sudo apt autoremove
• Now let’s do a special command to upgrade Bookworm packages to Trixie:
  sudo apt full-upgrade -y -o Dpkg::Options::="--force-confdef" -o Dpkg::Options::="--force-confnew" --purge --auto-remove
• It’ll start downloading now and will take a while to install all the new packages (over 1,000).
  
• During the process, you’ll be prompted about restarting services.
  Choose Yes so it won’t interrupt the process again.
  
• If you’re using the Desktop edition, update the display server using these metapackages:
  sudo apt install rpd-wayland-all rpd-x-all
  (If you’re using the Lite edition instead, skip this step).
• Choose Yes for any prompts that come up, like this one:
  
• Now we’re ready to sync and reboot:
  sudo sync
sudo reboot

That’s it, I’m now up-to-date with Trixie running on my Raspberry Pi 5:

Cleaning Up

After the upgrade, you can generally save some disk space by running these commands:
sudo apt autoremove
sudo apt autoclean

This will uninstall the dependencies that are no longer required, and clean the packages cache.

Not getting the same result?

Even when you follow every step, small differences in OS version, hardware or config can change the outcome. Instead of wasting time guessing, get help from people who have already fixed the same kind of issue.

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