balenaEtcher — The Complete Guide: Flash an OS Image to USB or SD Card in Three Steps
balenaEtcher, from the company balena, is an open-source flashing tool (Apache-2.0) that runs on Windows, macOS and Linux. Pick a file, pick a drive and press Flash — that is all. Use is free for any purpose, including commercial.
balenaEtcher
balena
Flashes OS images to USB drives and SD cards in three steps, with write verification and system drives hidden.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Three steps — an interface that is hard to get wrong, even if you flash once a year.
- Verification after writing — checks that the card or drive was written without errors.
- System disk protection — system drives are hidden by default.
- SD cards for Raspberry Pi — prepare a system for a measurement logger or a control project.
- Every operating system — write a Linux distribution even from a Mac.
When to choose it — and what to back up
Etcher is excellent for Linux images and Raspberry Pi, but it does not make a bootable Windows installer — use Rufus for that. Flashing erases everything that was on the card, including field measurement data saved on it, so copy that off first. It is built on Electron, so it is relatively heavy for such a simple tool.
Related tools
For Windows and DOS installers — Rufus. For one drive with several systems — Ventoy. To arrange partitions on the card or drive after flashing — GParted.
Rufus
Pete Batard
Creates bootable USB drives from Windows or Linux ISO images, in a small program that runs without installation.
Get it from the vendor
Ventoy
longpanda (Ventoy project)
One USB drive that boots many ISO files: copy the images to the drive and pick one from a menu, with no reformatting.
Get it from the vendor
GParted
GParted project (GNOME)
A graphical partition editor to create, resize, move and copy partitions, also as a live system booted from USB on any PC.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
The simplest and safest flasher for Linux images and SD cards on any operating system. For a Windows installer, switch to Rufus.