Upgrade Debian 12 to 13 in MINUTES

NixNexus

🚀 Upgrade Debian 12 (Bookworm) to Debian 13 (Trixie) the Safe & Easy Way! Your Debian 12 system won’t stay supported forever. In this step-by-step guide, I’ll walk you through the official and safest way to upgrade from Debian 12 to Debian 13 — without breaking your system.  👉 In this video, you’ll learn:  Why upgrading to Debian 13 is worth it (new features, performance, and security). Key architecture changes you must know before upgrading. How to properly clean up, back up, and prepare your system. How to edit repositories and switch from Bookworm to Trixie. The exact commands to safely perform the upgrade. What’s new in Debian 13 after reboot (kernel, desktop, packages).  🔔 If this guide helps, don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe for more Linux & FOSS tutorials.  📌 Watch Next: [https://youtu.be/Z31dQYCnldQ?si=nOCF8LCDJImMWMr1]  ==**SUPPORT US ON**==👇👇  Patreon: https://patreon.com/NixNexus Buy Me a Coffee: https://buymeacoffee.com/nixnexus SubscribeStar: https://subscribestar.com/nixnexus Liberapay: https://en.liberapay.com/NixNexus/ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/nixnexus  ==**FOLLOW US ON**==👇👇  Twitter(X): https://twitter.com/NixNexus360 Facebook: https://facebook.com/nixnexus360 Instagram: https://instagram.com/nixnexus360 Threads: https://threads.net/@nixnexus360 Mastodon: https://mastodon.social/@nixnexus Tumblr: https://tumblr.com/blog/nixnexus WhatsApp Channel: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaFQEVo84OmIjOfE5Q33 Telegram Channel: https://t.me/s/nixnexus Odysee: https://odysee.com/@NixNexus Dailymotion: https://dailymotion.com/nixnexus Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/c-5470472  ==**TIME STAMPS**==👇👇  00:00 - Why upgrade Debian 12 to 13? 00:36 - Key Benefits & Features of Debian 13 02:23 - Hardware Architecture Changes in Debian 13 03:25 - How to Update and Clean Up Debian 12 04:48 - How to remove Obsolete Packages from Debian 12 06:15 - How to disable Backports in Debian 12 07:57 - How to Backup Debian 12 Directories 09:46 - How to Edit Debian 12 Repositories to upgrade to Debian 13 11:34 - How to Execute Full Upgrade from Debian 12 to Debian 13  ==**INFO SOURCE**==👇👇  Release Notes for Debian 13 (trixie) - https://www.debian.org/releases/trixie/release-notes/upgrading.en.html  ==**STOCK VIDEO & IMAGE ATTRIBUTION**==👇👇  Wikimedia Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org under Creative Commons Licenses (https://creativecommons.org/) Canva: https://www.canva.com/ Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/ Pixabay: https://pixabay.com/  **If you Like the Content and wanted to support the Channel in a Simple ways Please Share this video to others and encourage them to subscribe the Channel (https://www.youtube.com/@NixNexus360?sub_confirmation=1)  Thank you :}   #Free&OpenSource #nixnexus360 #nixnexus360hindi #nixnexus360bangla #learnlinuxwithnixnexus #linuxrocks #Debian13 #Debian13upgrade #DebianTrixie #DebianBookwormtoTrixie #UpgradeDebian12to13 #Debianupgradeguide #Debian13features #DebianLinux2025 #howtoupgradeDebian

Transcript

00:00Hello friend. Did you know your Debian 12 system also has an expiry date? Do not

00:07risk running out of support. In this video I will show you the safest and the

00:12fastest way to upgrade to Debian 13. So you can unlock new features, better

00:18hardware support and five more years of rock-solid stability. But if you are

00:24thinking that upgrading from Debian 12 to Debian 13 does not worth it, then let me

00:30tell you the key benefits you will get with Debian 13 over Debian 12. For the

00:40first time Debian officially supports the RISC-V architecture, meaning now you can

00:46test or use Debian on a fully open source hardware. Using the Foronix tests

00:54suit, it was found that Debian 13 shows an average performance improvement of 10

01:00to 13 percent over Debian 12. Debian 13 features an upgrade from kernel 6.1 to

01:106.12 enhancing and optimizing performance for modern multi-core processors. Debian

01:19Debian 13 includes newer versions of essential software such as Ganusy

01:25compiler 14.2, Python 3.13 and OpenJDK 21 which improves efficiency and

01:33compatibility. The default GNOME desktop environment is upgraded from version 43 to

01:4248 along with all the other desktop environment, offering a more refined user

01:48experience. And as with all the previous releases, Debian 13 maintains the

01:56project's commitment to security enhancement and stability while

02:01integrating modern software trends. These improvements has already made Debian

02:0713 a compelling upgrade choice for many users who are seeking better performance,

02:13enhanced features and improve security. So, without wasting any time, let's future-proof

02:20your system as well. The upgrading process from Debian 12 to 13 stable release is

02:27generally very easy and straightforward. However, Debian's official documentation

02:33suggests that you should be informed about few key important details first,

02:38especially about the discontinued hardware architectures. Debian 13 has fully dropped

02:45support for x86 32-bit architecture. So, pure 32-bit systems cannot do this upgrade.

02:53Arm 32-bit still works but only with older Raspberry Pi models. And finally, Mips

03:01this architecture is gone completely. So, if you are on any of this architecture, you will

03:09have to switch your hardware. But if hardware is not an issue, then you have to follow

03:15few steps for the upgrade, which are majorly divided into these four categories. And you can

03:22start the upgrade process with the first step, that is update and cleanup. But before starting

03:30this whole process, let me show you my system specs using Neofage. So, here you can see that

03:37I am using Debian 12 and my kernel version is 6.1. Therefore, the first thing you have to

03:45do is update your system to the latest point release and then clean up your system. To do

03:51this, you have to use the following command.

03:55sudo apt update update and and and sudo apt upgrade-y

04:15and hit enter. The first two command will update your system to the latest. Then, the last two

04:42will remove your system's unused packages, dependencies and cache files. Then, after doing this, you have to

04:51continue with more cleanup process and check if there are any obsolete packages available on your system

04:59or not using this command. apt space list space single inverted comma or apostrophe

05:08question mark obsolete again single inverted comma or apostrophe and hit enter. If the result returns with nothing

05:18like this, then you can proceed to the next step. But if it shows that obsolete packages are present in your

05:25system just like I do, then you have to remove all of them before the actual system upgrade. To do that,

05:34you have to use the command sudo space apt space purge space single inverted comma question mark obsolete

05:47again single inverted comma or apostrophe and hit enter. This will remove all the obsolete packages from your

05:55system. You can re-verify if all the obsolete packages are gone or not using the previous command.

06:03Removing obsolete packages are very important because it may introduce complications during the upgrade

06:10process and can present security risk as they are no longer maintained. Then, if you have ever enabled the

06:17Debian backports facility on Debian 12 then you have to disable it as well. For that you have to check if

06:26backports repo is enabled or not using this command cat space forward slash etsy forward slash apt forward slash

06:35slash sources dot list space pipe space grip space backports and hit enter. If the result returns with nothing

06:51then you are all good to go. But if you see something like this, that means backports are enabled on your

06:58system and you have to disable it. For that you just have to uncomment or comment out the backport source

07:06line in the sources dot list file. I am using nano text editor for this demonstration but you can use

07:13any text editor to open the file and type sudo space nano space forward slash etsy forward slash

07:24slash sources dot list and hit enter. This will open the sources dot list file and you have to put a

07:35hash or a pound sign in front of the backports line just like this. And this will disable the backports

07:42line eventually disabling the backports service from Debian 12. And finally, if you have ever installed

07:50any non-Debian packages then you have to remove them as well, which will complete our first step.

07:57Then the second step in our list is backup. Before upgrading from Debian 12 to 13, Debian strongly

08:05recommends that you make a full backup of your system using apps like timeshift or you at least

08:11backup any data config file or information that you cannot afford to lose. Debian officially mentions to

08:20backup these directories. As the upgrade process itself does not modify anything in the slash home

08:30directory, you can back it up there or else you can use an external hard drive or usb drive as well.

08:37For better segregation, I will suggest you to create a separate slash backup directory inside the

08:44slash home directory. And for backing up, use the following command.

08:49sudo space cp. cp stands for copy. Then space hyphen r. R stands for recursive. Meaning,

08:59the copy function will copy the directory as well as the subdirectories. Then space

09:06space slash etsy space slash var slash lib slash dpkg space forward slash var slash lib slash apt space

09:23hyphen t. This means to meaning it is pointing to the destination directory space forward slash home

09:32forward slash username in my case it will be nixnexus forward slash backup and hit enter. This backup process

09:43will usually be complete within two minutes. Then our third step will be editing the repository.

09:50Here you have to switch the Debian repository from Bookworm to Trixie by updating the sources.list file.

10:00For that you have to open and edit the sources.list file. I will again use the nano text editor and the command

10:09sudo space nano space forward slash etsy forward slash apt forward slash sources.list and hit enter.

10:21Here the goal is to replace all the words Bookworm with Trixie. Just for clarification,

10:28the words which we are using here are the codenames of different Debian versions. Bookworm is the codename

10:35of Debian 12 and Trixie is the codename of the present stable version that is Debian 13.

10:42You can individually edit all the lines but the quickest way to do this will be using the replace

10:49function. For that you have to hit ctrl plus backslash. Then it will ask you to enter the word you want to

10:58search or replace. So you will write bookworm and then hit enter. Next it will ask to enter the word

11:08that bookworm that you want bookworm to be replaced with. So here you will have to enter Trixie and then

11:15press enter. Following with A to replace all at once. Then you will have to enter ctrl plus O to save and

11:26ctrl plus X to exit. And our repo editing will be complete here. And finally after this you can now

11:35upgrade your system from Debian 12 to 13. For that you have to open the terminal and run the following

11:43command to start the upgrade process. First you should just update the repo with

11:50sudo apt update and hit enter. This will take three to five minutes depending on your internet speed.

12:00So let me speed it up.

12:04Ok next, to minimize the risk of breaking the system during the early stages of the major version upgrade

12:11Debian recommends to just upgrade the system with the minimal base install. And to do that

12:18you have to use this command sudo space apt space upgrade space hyphen hyphen without hyphen new hyphen

12:33pkgs which stand for packages and hit enter. This ensures all the current packages are updated without

12:42introducing new ones thereby reducing the likelihood of dependency issues.

12:48And by the way during this upgrade process the installer might show you some manuals

12:54which you can skip by using ctrl plus q command. And it might also ask you about several services

13:01being restarted. So hit yes or no according to your preferences after carefully reading the message.

13:09After this is done you can now execute the full upgrade with sudo space apt space full hyphen upgrade

13:22and hit enter. This full upgrade might take between 10 to 20 minutes depending on your internet speed.

13:29This will handle all the dependency changes install new packages while completing the transition to the new release.

13:37Wait for the download and installation of packages. And after the upgrade is complete use sudo space apt space modernize hyphen sources

13:51to modernize the sources file. Because Debian from version 13 onwards is transitioning to a newer more structured format called

14:01dev822 which will be using .sources file instead of .list files. And when this is done you can reboot your system with sudo space systemctl space reboot.

14:17And our upgrade is complete. So let me enter my user password. And here we are in a newly upgraded Debian Trixie.

14:31Let's download fastfetch to check the system details.

14:35Here you can see our operating system is Debian 13 Trixie. Our desktop environment is GNOME48. We are using Wayland. And our kernel version is 6.12 which is a long term support kernel.

14:52So there you have it. I hope this video will make your Debian upgrade much easier.

15:00But if you still have any question or confusion, feel free to reach me in the comment section below.

15:06And if you have found this guide helpful, then check out my Debian 13 fresh installation guide.

15:12Or subscribe to the channel for more open source tips.

15:15See you in the next video. Until then, keep learning and keep using Linux.

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