Manual: apt-get
APT-GET(8) APT APT-GET(8)
NAME
apt-get - APT package handling utility -- command-line interface
SYNOPSIS
apt-get [-sqdyfmubV] [-o=config_string] [-c=config_file] [-t=target_release] [-a=architecture] {update | upgrade |
dselect-upgrade | dist-upgrade | install pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]... | remove pkg... |
purge pkg... | source pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]... |
build-dep pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]... |
download pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]... | check | clean | autoclean | autoremove |
{-v | --version} | {-h | --help}}
DESCRIPTION
apt-get is the command-line tool for handling packages, and may be considered the user's "back-end" to other tools
using the APT library. Several "front-end" interfaces exist, such as aptitude(8), synaptic(8) and wajig(1).
Unless the -h, or --help option is given, one of the commands below must be present.
update
update is used to resynchronize the package index files from their sources. The indexes of available packages are
fetched from the location(s) specified in /etc/apt/sources.list. For example, when using a Debian archive, this
command retrieves and scans the Packages.gz files, so that information about new and updated packages is
available. An update should always be performed before an upgrade or dist-upgrade. Please be aware that the
overall progress meter will be incorrect as the size of the package files cannot be known in advance.
upgrade
upgrade is used to install the newest versions of all packages currently installed on the system from the sources
enumerated in /etc/apt/sources.list. Packages currently installed with new versions available are retrieved and
upgraded; under no circumstances are currently installed packages removed, or packages not already installed
retrieved and installed. New versions of currently installed packages that cannot be upgraded without changing
the install status of another package will be left at their current version. An update must be performed first so
that apt-get knows that new versions of packages are available.
When a package is supplied as an argument, the package will be installed prior to the upgrade action.
dist-upgrade
dist-upgrade in addition to performing the function of upgrade, also intelligently handles changing dependencies
with new versions of packages; apt-get has a "smart" conflict resolution system, and it will attempt to upgrade
the most important packages at the expense of less important ones if necessary. The dist-upgrade command may
therefore remove some packages. The /etc/apt/sources.list file contains a list of locations from which to
retrieve desired package files. See also apt_preferences(5) for a mechanism for overriding the general settings
for individual packages.
When a package is supplied as an argument, the package will be installed prior to the upgrade action.
dselect-upgrade
dselect-upgrade is used in conjunction with the traditional Debian packaging front-end, dselect(1).
dselect-upgrade follows the changes made by dselect(1) to the Status field of available packages, and performs
the actions necessary to realize that state (for instance, the removal of old and the installation of new
packages).
install
install is followed by one or more packages desired for installation or upgrading. Each package is a package
name, not a fully qualified filename (for instance, in a Debian system, apt-utils would be the argument provided,
not apt-utils_3.2.0_amd64.deb). All packages required by the package(s) specified for installation will also be
retrieved and installed. The /etc/apt/sources.list file is used to locate the desired packages. If a hyphen is
appended to the package name (with no intervening space), the identified package will be removed if it is
installed. Similarly a plus sign can be used to designate a package to install. These latter features may be used
to override decisions made by apt-get's conflict resolution system.
A specific version of a package can be selected for installation by following the package name with an equals and
the version of the package to select. This will cause that version to be located and selected for install.
Alternatively a specific distribution can be selected by following the package name with a slash and the version
of the distribution or the Archive name (stable, testing, unstable).
Both of the version selection mechanisms can downgrade packages and must be used with care.
This is also the target to use if you want to upgrade one or more already-installed packages without upgrading
every package you have on your system. Unlike the "upgrade" target, which installs the newest version of all
currently installed packages, "install" will install the newest version of only the package(s) specified. Simply
provide the name of the package(s) you wish to upgrade, and if a newer version is available, it (and its
dependencies, as described above) will be downloaded and installed.
Finally, the apt_preferences(5) mechanism allows you to create an alternative installation policy for individual
packages.
If no package matches the given expression and the expression contains one of '.', '?' or '*' then it is assumed
to be a POSIX regular expression, and it is applied to all package names in the database. Any matches are then
installed (or removed). Note that matching is done by substring so 'lo.*' matches 'how-lo' and 'lowest'. If this
is undesired, anchor the regular expression with a '^' or '$' character, or create a more specific regular
expression.
Fallback to regular expressions is deprecated in APT 2.0, has been removed in apt(8), except for anchored
expressions, and will be removed from apt-get(8) in a future version. Use apt-patterns(7) instead.
reinstall
reinstall is an alias for install --reinstall.
remove
remove is identical to install except that packages are removed instead of installed. Note that removing a
package leaves its configuration files on the system. If a plus sign is appended to the package name (with no
intervening space), the identified package will be installed instead of removed.
purge
purge is identical to remove except that packages are removed and purged (any configuration files are deleted
too).
source
source causes apt-get to fetch source packages. APT will examine the available packages to decide which source
package to fetch. It will then find and download into the current directory the newest available version of that
source package while respecting the default release, set with the option APT::Default-Release, the -t option or
per package with the pkg/release syntax, if possible.
The arguments are interpreted as binary and source package names. See the --only-source option if you want to
change that.
Source packages are tracked separately from binary packages via deb-src lines in the sources.list(5) file. This
means that you will need to add such a line for each repository you want to get sources from; otherwise you will
probably get either the wrong (too old/too new) source versions or none at all.
If the --compile option is specified then the package will be compiled to a binary .deb using dpkg-buildpackage
for the architecture as defined by the --host-architecture option. If --download-only is specified then the
source package will not be unpacked.
A specific source version can be retrieved by postfixing the source name with an equals and then the version to
fetch, similar to the mechanism used for the package files. This enables exact matching of the source package
name and version, implicitly enabling the APT::Get::Only-Source option.
Note that source packages are not installed and tracked in the dpkg database like binary packages; they are
simply downloaded to the current directory, like source tarballs.
build-dep
build-dep causes apt-get to install/remove packages in an attempt to satisfy the build dependencies for a source
package. By default the dependencies are satisfied to build the package natively. If desired a host-architecture
can be specified with the --host-architecture option instead.
The arguments are interpreted as binary or source package names. See the --only-source option if you want to
change that.
satisfy
satisfy causes apt-get to satisfy the given dependency strings. The dependency strings may have build profiles
and architecture restriction list as in build dependencies. They may optionally be prefixed with "Conflicts: " to
unsatisfy the dependency string. Multiple strings of the same type can be specified.
Example: apt-get satisfy "foo" "Conflicts: bar" "baz (>> 1.0) | bar (= 2.0), moo"
The legacy operator '' is not supported, use '<=/>=' instead.
check
check is a diagnostic tool; it updates the package cache and checks for broken dependencies.
download
download will download the given binary package into the current directory. The authenticity of the package data
is ensured as usual.
clean
clean clears out the local repository of retrieved package files. It removes everything but the lock file from
/var/cache/apt/archives/ and /var/cache/apt/archives/partial/.
autoclean (and the auto-clean alias since 1.1)
Like clean, autoclean clears out the local repository of retrieved package files. The difference is that it only
removes package files that can no longer be downloaded, and are largely useless. This allows a cache to be
maintained over a long period without it growing out of control. The configuration option APT::Clean-Installed
will prevent installed packages from being erased if it is set to off.
distclean (and the dist-clean alias)
distclean removes all files under /var/lib/apt/lists except Release, Release.gpg, and InRelease. It can be used
for example, when finalizing images distributed to users. The release files are kept for security reasons, to
prevent various types of attacks.
autoremove (and the auto-remove alias since 1.1)
autoremove is used to remove packages that were automatically installed to satisfy dependencies for other
packages and are now no longer needed.
autopurge
Like autoremove, but autopurge also removes configuration files. This is a shortcut for autoremove --purge.
changelog
changelog tries to download the changelog of a package and displays it through sensible-pager. By default it
displays the changelog for the version that is installed. However, you can specify the same options as for the
install command.
indextargets
Displays by default a deb822 formatted listing of information about all data files (aka index targets) apt-get
update would download. Supports a --format option to modify the output format as well as accepts lines of the
default output to filter the records by. The command is mainly used as an interface for external tools working
with APT to get information as well as filenames for downloaded files so they can use them as well instead of
downloading them again on their own. Detailed documentation is omitted here and can instead be found in the file
/usr/share/doc/apt/acquire-additional-files.md.gz shipped by the apt-doc package.
OPTIONS
All command line options may be set using the configuration file, the descriptions indicate the configuration option
to set. For boolean options you can override the config file by using something like -f-,--no-f, -f=no or several
other variations.
--no-install-recommends
Do not consider recommended packages as a dependency for installing. Configuration Item: APT::Install-Recommends.
--install-suggests
Consider suggested packages as a dependency for installing. Configuration Item: APT::Install-Suggests.
-d, --download-only
Download only; package files are only retrieved, not unpacked or installed. Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Download-Only.
-f, --fix-broken
Fix; attempt to correct a system with broken dependencies in place. This option, when used with install/remove,
can omit any packages to permit APT to deduce a likely solution. If packages are specified, these have to
completely correct the problem. The option is sometimes necessary when running APT for the first time; APT itself
does not allow broken package dependencies to exist on a system. It is possible that a system's dependency
structure can be so corrupt as to require manual intervention (which usually means using dpkg --remove to
eliminate some of the offending packages). Use of this option together with -m may produce an error in some
situations. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Fix-Broken.
-m, --ignore-missing, --fix-missing
Ignore missing packages; if packages cannot be retrieved or fail the integrity check after retrieval (corrupted
package files), hold back those packages and handle the result. Use of this option together with -f may produce
an error in some situations. If a package is selected for installation (particularly if it is mentioned on the
command line) and it could not be downloaded then it will be silently held back. Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Fix-Missing.
--no-download
Disables downloading of packages. This is best used with --ignore-missing to force APT to use only the .debs it
has already downloaded. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Download.
-q, --quiet
Quiet; produces output suitable for logging, omitting progress indicators. More q's will produce more quiet up to
a maximum of 2. You can also use -q=# to set the quiet level, overriding the configuration file. Note that quiet
level 2 implies -y; you should never use -qq without a no-action modifier such as -d, --print-uris or -s as APT
may decide to do something you did not expect. Configuration Item: quiet.
-s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on the current system state but do not actually
change the system. Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking) so the system state could change while apt-get is
running. Simulations can also be executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all apt
configuration distorting the simulation. A notice expressing this warning is also shown by default for non-root
users (APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item: APT::Get::Simulate.
Simulated runs print out a series of lines, each representing a dpkg operation: configure (Conf), remove (Remv)
or unpack (Inst). Square brackets indicate broken packages, and empty square brackets indicate breaks that are of
no consequence (rare).
-y, --yes, --assume-yes
Automatic yes to prompts; assume "yes" as answer to all prompts and run non-interactively. If an undesirable
situation, such as changing a held package, trying to install an unauthenticated package or removing an essential
package occurs then apt-get will abort. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Assume-Yes.
--assume-no
Automatic "no" to all prompts. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Assume-No.
--no-show-upgraded
Do not show a list of all packages that are to be upgraded. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Show-Upgraded.
-V, --verbose-versions
Show full versions for upgraded and installed packages. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Show-Versions.
--no-list-columns
Display package lists without arranging them in columns. By default, package lists are printed in the style of
the "ls" command. Configuration Item: APT::Get::List-Columns.
--comment
Add the given value to the Comment: field in history.log Configuration Item: APT::History::Comment.
-a, --host-architecture
This option controls the architecture packages are built for by apt-get source --compile and how
cross-builddependencies are satisfied. By default is it not set which means that the host architecture is the
same as the build architecture (which is defined by APT::Architecture). Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Host-Architecture.
-P, --build-profiles
This option controls the activated build profiles for which a source package is built by apt-get source --compile
and how build dependencies are satisfied. By default no build profile is active. More than one build profile can
be activated at a time by concatenating them with a comma. Configuration Item: APT::Build-Profiles.
-b, --compile, --build
Compile source packages after downloading them. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Compile.
--ignore-hold
Ignore package holds; this causes apt-get to ignore a hold placed on a package. This may be useful in conjunction
with dist-upgrade to override a large number of undesired holds. Configuration Item: APT::Ignore-Hold.
--with-new-pkgs
Allow installing new packages when used in conjunction with upgrade. This is useful if the update of an installed
package requires new dependencies to be installed. Instead of holding the package back upgrade will upgrade the
package and install the new dependencies. Note that upgrade with this option will never remove packages, only
allow adding new ones. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Upgrade-Allow-New.
--no-upgrade
Do not upgrade packages; when used in conjunction with install, no-upgrade will prevent packages on the command
line from being upgraded if they are already installed. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Upgrade.
--only-upgrade
Do not install new packages; when used in conjunction with install, only-upgrade will install upgrades for
already installed packages only and ignore requests to install new packages. Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Only-Upgrade.
--allow-downgrades
This is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting if it is doing downgrades. It should
not be used except in very special situations. Using it can potentially destroy your system! Configuration Item:
APT::Get::allow-downgrades. Introduced in APT 1.1.
--allow-remove-essential
Force yes; this is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting if it is removing
essentials. It should not be used except in very special situations. Using it can potentially destroy your
system! Configuration Item: APT::Get::allow-remove-essential. Introduced in APT 1.1.
--allow-change-held-packages
Force yes; this is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting if it is changing held
packages. It should not be used except in very special situations. Using it can potentially destroy your system!
Configuration Item: APT::Get::allow-change-held-packages. Introduced in APT 1.1.
--force-yes
Force yes; this is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting if it is doing something
potentially harmful. It should not be used except in very special situations. Using force-yes can potentially
destroy your system! Configuration Item: APT::Get::force-yes. This is deprecated and replaced by
--allow-unauthenticated , --allow-downgrades , --allow-remove-essential , --allow-change-held-packages in 1.1.
--print-uris
Instead of fetching the files to install their URIs are printed. Each URI will have the path, the destination
file name, the size and the expected MD5 hash. Note that the file name to write to will not always match the file
name on the remote site! This also works with the source and update commands. When used with the update command
the MD5 and size are not included, and it is up to the user to decompress any compressed files. Configuration
Item: APT::Get::Print-URIs.
--purge
Use purge instead of remove for anything that would be removed. An asterisk ("*") will be displayed next to
packages which are scheduled to be purged. remove --purge is equivalent to the purge command. Configuration
Item: APT::Get::Purge.
--reinstall
Re-install packages that are already installed and at the newest version. Configuration Item:
APT::Get::ReInstall.
--list-cleanup
This option is on by default; use --no-list-cleanup to turn it off. When it is on, apt-get will automatically
manage the contents of /var/lib/apt/lists to ensure that obsolete files are erased. The only reason to turn it
off is if you frequently change your sources list. Configuration Item: APT::Get::List-Cleanup.
-S, --snapshot
This option controls the snapshot chosen for archives with Snapshot: enable in the source entry. For example, -S
20220102T030405Z selects a snapshot from January 2nd, 2022 at 03:04:05 UTC. Configuration Item: APT::Snapshot;
see also the sources.list(5) manual page.
-t, --target-release, --default-release
This option controls the default input to the policy engine; it creates a default pin at priority 990 using the
specified release string. This overrides the general settings in /etc/apt/preferences. Specifically pinned
packages are not affected by the value of this option. In short, this option lets you have simple control over
which distribution packages will be retrieved from. Some common examples might be -t '2.1*', -t unstable or -t
sid. Configuration Item: APT::Default-Release; see also the apt_preferences(5) manual page.
--trivial-only
Only perform operations that are 'trivial'. Logically this can be considered related to --assume-yes; where
--assume-yes will answer yes to any prompt, --trivial-only will answer no. Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Trivial-Only.
--mark-auto
After successful installation, mark all freshly installed packages as automatically installed, which will cause
each of the packages to be removed when no more manually installed packages depend on this package. This is
equally to running apt-mark auto for all installed packages. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Mark-Auto.
--no-remove
If any packages are to be removed apt-get immediately aborts without prompting. Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Remove.
--auto-remove, --autoremove
If the command is either install or remove, then this option acts like running the autoremove command, removing
unused dependency packages. Configuration Item: APT::Get::AutomaticRemove.
--only-source
Only has meaning for the source and build-dep commands. Indicates that the given source names are not to be
mapped through the binary table. This means that if this option is specified, these commands will only accept
source package names as arguments, rather than accepting binary package names and looking up the corresponding
source package. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Only-Source.
--diff-only, --dsc-only, --tar-only
Download only the diff, dsc, or tar file of a source archive. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Diff-Only,
APT::Get::Dsc-Only, and APT::Get::Tar-Only.
--arch-only
Only process architecture-dependent build-dependencies. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Arch-Only.
--indep-only
Only process architecture-independent build-dependencies. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Indep-Only.
--allow-unauthenticated
Ignore if packages can't be authenticated and don't prompt about it. This can be useful while working with local
repositories, but is a huge security risk if data authenticity isn't ensured in another way by the user itself.
The usage of the Trusted option for sources.list(5) entries should usually be preferred over this global
override. Configuration Item: APT::Get::AllowUnauthenticated.
--allow-insecure-repositories
Allow the update command to acquire unverifiable data from configured sources. APT will otherwise fail at the
update command for repositories without valid cryptographically signatures. See also apt-secure(8) for details on
the concept and the implications. Configuration Item: Acquire::AllowInsecureRepositories.
--allow-releaseinfo-change
Allow the update command to continue downloading data from a repository which changed its information of the
release contained in the repository indicating e.g a new major release. APT will fail at the update command for
such repositories until the change is confirmed to ensure the user is prepared for the change. See also apt-
secure(8) for details on the concept and configuration.
Specialist options (--allow-releaseinfo-change-field) exist to allow changes only for certain fields like origin,
label, codename, suite, version and defaultpin. See also apt_preferences(5). Configuration Item:
Acquire::AllowReleaseInfoChange.
--show-progress
Show user friendly progress information in the terminal window when packages are installed, upgraded or removed.
For a machine parsable version of this data see README.progress-reporting in the apt doc directory. Configuration
Items: Dpkg::Progress and Dpkg::Progress-Fancy.
--with-source filename
Adds the given file as a source for metadata. Can be repeated to add multiple files. See --with-source
description in apt-cache(8) for further details.
-eany, --error-on=any
Fail the update command if any error occured, even a transient one.
-U, --update
Run the update command before the specified command. This is supported for commands installing, removing, or
upgrading packages such as install, remove, safe-upgrade, full-upgrade. This can be useful to ensure a command
always installs the latest versions, or, in combination with the --snapshot option to make sure the snapshot is
present when install is being run.
Caveat: Due to technical limitations, locks are acquired individually for each phase, hence an install may fail
to acquire locks after successfully executing the update. Until this is resolved, this is merely syntactic sugar
for apt update && apt install
-h, --help
Show a short usage summary.
-v, --version
Show the program version.
--audit
Show audit (and notice) messages. This overrides the quiet option, but only for notice messages, not progress
ones.
-c, --config-file
Configuration File; Specify a configuration file to use. The program will read the default configuration file and
then this configuration file. If configuration settings need to be set before the default configuration files are
parsed specify a file with the APT_CONFIG environment variable. See apt.conf(5) for syntax information.
-o, --option
Set a Configuration Option; This will set an arbitrary configuration option. The syntax is -o Foo::Bar=bar. -o
and --option can be used multiple times to set different options.
--cli-version
Requests a specific CLI version. This is a pattern that takes a MAJOR.MINOR version. You may omit the MINOR
version, in which case the latest supported minor level will be used.
Version tracks are presented as follows: The version 3.2 has equivalent versions 0.32, 1.22, and 2.12,
implementing new features for their specified major versions.
A special case is the X.9 version pattern: A version like 2.9 is followed by 3.0, but 2.10 follows directly on
2.8; given that we use odd version numbers as development series (2.9 is the 3.0 development series).
This feature has been introduced in APT 3.1.10, and replaces the binary-specific configuration. You may use the
APT::Version to similar effect on older binaries, for example, use -o APT::Version=2 to make apt(8) behave like
the 2.x series.
The default value is the current APT version for apt(8) and 0.(10 * major + minor) for the classic commands. The
0.X series is soft-deprecated and the other commands will roll over to the 2.x series in the future.
--no-color, --color
Turn colors on or off. Colors are on by default on supported terminals for apt(8) and can also be disabled using
the NO_COLOR or APT_NO_COLOR environment variables, or further configured by the APT::Color configuration option
and scope, see apt.conf(5) for information on that.
FILES
/etc/apt/sources.list
Locations to fetch packages from. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::SourceList.
/etc/apt/sources.list.d/
File fragments for locations to fetch packages from. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::SourceParts.
/etc/apt/apt.conf
APT configuration file. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::Main.
/etc/apt/apt.conf.d/
APT configuration file fragments. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::Parts.
/etc/apt/preferences
Version preferences file. This is where you would specify "pinning", i.e. a preference to get certain packages
from a separate source or from a different version of a distribution. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::Preferences.
/etc/apt/preferences.d/
File fragments for the version preferences. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::PreferencesParts.
/var/cache/apt/archives/
Storage area for retrieved package files. Configuration Item: Dir::Cache::Archives.
/var/cache/apt/archives/partial/
Storage area for package files in transit. Configuration Item: Dir::Cache::Archives (partial will be implicitly
appended)
/var/lib/apt/lists/
Storage area for state information for each package resource specified in sources.list(5) Configuration Item:
Dir::State::Lists.
/var/lib/apt/lists/partial/
Storage area for state information in transit. Configuration Item: Dir::State::Lists (partial will be implicitly
appended)
SEE ALSO
apt-cache(8), apt-cdrom(8), dpkg(1), sources.list(5), apt.conf(5), apt-patterns(7), apt-config(8), apt-secure(8), The
APT User's guide in /usr/share/doc/apt-doc/, apt_preferences(5), the APT Howto.
DIAGNOSTICS
apt-get returns zero on normal operation, decimal 100 on error.
BUGS
APT bug page[1]. If you wish to report a bug in APT, please see /usr/share/doc/debian/bug-reporting.txt or the
reportbug(1) command.
AUTHORS
Jason Gunthorpe
APT team
NOTES
1. APT bug page
https://bugs.debian.org/src:apt
APT 3.2.0 10 June 2025 APT-GET(8)