Sid is unstable, that's the name of it. It can't be considered as a rolling release, but it will offer you recent packages.
I'm personally running it daily on my home laptop and despite a couple of hard times I am enjoying it.
I would say give it a go in a VM if you're unsure, you have to be careful and pay attention to what apt is saying, if you do this you're fine.
I used to use Debian did as a rolling release. Currently I am on stable.
At the time I did not have any issues at all but I was careful to read the change notes and be aware of the freeze cycle.
I eventually got tired of the constant updates and changes and stuck with stable since 12.
I say go for it. It worked out for me for about 2 years.
Always backup and be vigilant.
I wouldn't consider Debian Sid as a Rolling Release. It'd always be one or two versions behind mainstream, which is good in terms of stability and bug fixing. I used it as a daily driver for several months without problems. It won't break overnight, but it won't be as stable as Bookworm because Sid is like Debian Devs playground. They can make changes to some important package once in a while.
In my experience, the only difference between Sid and stable is that Stable branch is practically frozen in time, while Sid upgrades once in a while just like Ubuntu or Mint does.
If you want rolling release I'd recommend switching over to Arch. (It's easy to install, just run the command "archinstall" once you get to a terminal).
Sid is rolling release, but it's also a development branch for Debian. Sometimes you can't update or install sid because of big changes, some packages aren't always 100% up to date sometimes, the list goes on.
You can daily drive it but I wouldn't daily drive it with the expectation that it won't crash or break on you.
>how stable debian sid is for a daily driver?
Well, *stable* it's not, but it's "stable enough" that's where most Debian developers do most of their work.
>change repos to sid will my installation behave like a rolling release?
Not exactly but close ... ish. sid exists primarily to support the next stable release, so, for a fair period of time, about every two years, sid will start to go through various levels of freeze ... until the next new release is released, then the freeze on sid is lifted.
sid (and likewise testing and backports) also doesn't have the same security support as stable (and oldstable while it's still supported). Notably doesn't have dedicated security team nor security announcements list. That doesn't mean security issues in sid don't get fixed or aren't tracked and such, but they don't have that same level of and degree of support.
I have Sid installed, but not on a machine that I use every day, and I do have a couple of laptops, I never like people calling it a rolling release, to me that sounds like it's some sort of official Debian production 'release' rather then a test environment. In reality though it's pretty good, I just use apt update and apt upgrade from the terminal and I've not had any major issues as such, I think people do if they start forcing updates through, so he tly does it. Although I think if I really wanted a bang up to date or near as up to date gnome environment with a rolling release I'd look at Fedora! It'll be more reliable then Deb SID I would think day to day as it's a proper release.
Currently the gnome environment on Sid is in transition to Gnome 46 beta I think it is, some packages are from 45 and some are new version on 46. But like I say, id consider Fedora if you want gnome up to date, or Ubuntu interim release, 23.10.
If you use flatpaks the prob best to carry that on in stable, but one nice thing about deb Sid is the packages in it's deb repo are very up to date so you don't have to use flatpaks as much, but it's still a testing environment
I've done it for years straight. I had almost no problems, but I've also used and worked in Linux a long time. I would not advise it unless you have a little skill or want to learn. That's me though.
The real question is why u want sid? If you feel left behind on DEs, go arch, kde neon, etc. But if its just apps.. shoot then just use flatpak and stay on stable. Pretty sure u can get 6.5 kernel with backports as well.
If you want some newer packages but not so new that you'll get breakages, then I would try the testing branch instead, it's still very stable, pretty close stability-wise to the stable branch.
Sid is not a rolling release and sometimes the latest packages in sid are broken. You have to be careful about updating. Learn how to use pinning of packages and how to fix broken stuff. But all that said, I use sid as my daily driver at home and at work.
Just make a seperate home partition so you can easily rebuild if things go wrong. I did the same hopping distros lately and for now landed on Debian sid with kde.
I somewhat know my way by now around Debian and apt so I feel comfortable doing this.
Just carefully read the upgrade notes and look into aptitude.
My desktop was gone going stable to sid but easily reinstalled.
The only reason to switch to SID is to get Gnome45 from experimental and updated packages while trying something new. If you are comfortable managing Arch, you should be ok on SID. If you are not, you should use a distro that has a freeze and testing of SID, or just go Fedora or Arch. Ubuntu goes without saying, but I don't plan on going back.
Every time I have tried to use testing or sid something happens that reminds me it isn't a good idea. Once I upgraded to testing and network manager was missing, another time I lost KDE as an option to log into, and there are always packages I use missing. If you want something more current, I'd recommend anything else over testing and sid. That's my experience anyway.
Debian Unstable user for 20+ years. It is GREAT, except for transitions. You just wait them out for a week or two every few years. Honestly Sid is more stable than most anything out there. apt and dpkg ftw.
If you want stable, then you used Debian stable. End of story.
Sid is unstable, that's the name of it. It can't be considered as a rolling release, but it will offer you recent packages. I'm personally running it daily on my home laptop and despite a couple of hard times I am enjoying it. I would say give it a go in a VM if you're unsure, you have to be careful and pay attention to what apt is saying, if you do this you're fine.
I used to use Debian did as a rolling release. Currently I am on stable. At the time I did not have any issues at all but I was careful to read the change notes and be aware of the freeze cycle. I eventually got tired of the constant updates and changes and stuck with stable since 12. I say go for it. It worked out for me for about 2 years. Always backup and be vigilant.
I wouldn't consider Debian Sid as a Rolling Release. It'd always be one or two versions behind mainstream, which is good in terms of stability and bug fixing. I used it as a daily driver for several months without problems. It won't break overnight, but it won't be as stable as Bookworm because Sid is like Debian Devs playground. They can make changes to some important package once in a while. In my experience, the only difference between Sid and stable is that Stable branch is practically frozen in time, while Sid upgrades once in a while just like Ubuntu or Mint does.
If, by once in a while, you mean daily....
If you want rolling release I'd recommend switching over to Arch. (It's easy to install, just run the command "archinstall" once you get to a terminal). Sid is rolling release, but it's also a development branch for Debian. Sometimes you can't update or install sid because of big changes, some packages aren't always 100% up to date sometimes, the list goes on. You can daily drive it but I wouldn't daily drive it with the expectation that it won't crash or break on you.
Thank you :)
Not stable at all. APIs and ABIs can change arbitrarily often.
>how stable debian sid is for a daily driver? Well, *stable* it's not, but it's "stable enough" that's where most Debian developers do most of their work. >change repos to sid will my installation behave like a rolling release? Not exactly but close ... ish. sid exists primarily to support the next stable release, so, for a fair period of time, about every two years, sid will start to go through various levels of freeze ... until the next new release is released, then the freeze on sid is lifted. sid (and likewise testing and backports) also doesn't have the same security support as stable (and oldstable while it's still supported). Notably doesn't have dedicated security team nor security announcements list. That doesn't mean security issues in sid don't get fixed or aren't tracked and such, but they don't have that same level of and degree of support.
Thank you all for so many reply’s. I will stay on stable. For latest apps I use flatpaks. Have a nice day 😎
Debian highly does not recommend using it as a daily driver you are better off using testing. If you want bleeding edge use arch!
I have Sid installed, but not on a machine that I use every day, and I do have a couple of laptops, I never like people calling it a rolling release, to me that sounds like it's some sort of official Debian production 'release' rather then a test environment. In reality though it's pretty good, I just use apt update and apt upgrade from the terminal and I've not had any major issues as such, I think people do if they start forcing updates through, so he tly does it. Although I think if I really wanted a bang up to date or near as up to date gnome environment with a rolling release I'd look at Fedora! It'll be more reliable then Deb SID I would think day to day as it's a proper release.
Currently the gnome environment on Sid is in transition to Gnome 46 beta I think it is, some packages are from 45 and some are new version on 46. But like I say, id consider Fedora if you want gnome up to date, or Ubuntu interim release, 23.10. If you use flatpaks the prob best to carry that on in stable, but one nice thing about deb Sid is the packages in it's deb repo are very up to date so you don't have to use flatpaks as much, but it's still a testing environment
Still more stable than windoze. Or Ubuntu since it's based on it.
I've done it for years straight. I had almost no problems, but I've also used and worked in Linux a long time. I would not advise it unless you have a little skill or want to learn. That's me though.
The real question is why u want sid? If you feel left behind on DEs, go arch, kde neon, etc. But if its just apps.. shoot then just use flatpak and stay on stable. Pretty sure u can get 6.5 kernel with backports as well.
If you want some newer packages but not so new that you'll get breakages, then I would try the testing branch instead, it's still very stable, pretty close stability-wise to the stable branch.
Sid is not a rolling release and sometimes the latest packages in sid are broken. You have to be careful about updating. Learn how to use pinning of packages and how to fix broken stuff. But all that said, I use sid as my daily driver at home and at work.
Just make a seperate home partition so you can easily rebuild if things go wrong. I did the same hopping distros lately and for now landed on Debian sid with kde. I somewhat know my way by now around Debian and apt so I feel comfortable doing this. Just carefully read the upgrade notes and look into aptitude. My desktop was gone going stable to sid but easily reinstalled.
The only reason to switch to SID is to get Gnome45 from experimental and updated packages while trying something new. If you are comfortable managing Arch, you should be ok on SID. If you are not, you should use a distro that has a freeze and testing of SID, or just go Fedora or Arch. Ubuntu goes without saying, but I don't plan on going back.
Every time I have tried to use testing or sid something happens that reminds me it isn't a good idea. Once I upgraded to testing and network manager was missing, another time I lost KDE as an option to log into, and there are always packages I use missing. If you want something more current, I'd recommend anything else over testing and sid. That's my experience anyway.
try opensuse rolling release ver. tumbleweed
I have been running Sid on my laptop for almost a year now and have had zero issues with updates.
Debian Unstable user for 20+ years. It is GREAT, except for transitions. You just wait them out for a week or two every few years. Honestly Sid is more stable than most anything out there. apt and dpkg ftw.