Find which Debian or ubuntu Linux Version you are running

Posted on September 30, 2006 by ruchi 20 Comments

There are times debian or ubuntu users and admins want to find which version of debian and ubuntu linux version is running on their machines.This is very useful for those who is helping their customers and they want to know which version they are running and if you took over new system admin job you want to know which version is running on your servers or desktops.

Find or identify which version of Debian Linux you are running

This can be checked in /etc/debian_version file

Find or identify which version of ubuntu Linux you are running

You can find in different ways in ubuntu

Solution 1

cat /etc/issue

The file /etc/issue holds the version of Ubuntu installed on your system

Solution 2

lsb_release -a

cat /etc/lsb-release

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20 thoughts on “Find which Debian or ubuntu Linux Version you are running”

Darshak on December 28, 2006 at 11:46 am said:

Not sure if it always works, but Firefox’s default home page contains a welcome message with the version number.
Ionut on January 30, 2008 at 5:29 pm said:

Firefox’s About dialog also contains the operating system:
Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8.1.11) Gecko/20071204 Ubuntu/7.10 (gutsy) Firefox/2.0.0.11
Felipe on August 29, 2008 at 1:57 pm said:

I’ve found much better the firefox way rather than the console one.

While the /etc/debian_version file just says : “testing/unstable”

the other one gives me a lot of info about my OS.
Darin on February 7, 2009 at 6:47 pm said:

If you just need the version number (for scripting, etc), you can do something like this:

VERSION=`lsb_release -sd | cut -c 8-`
echo Configuring for Ubuntu ${VERSION}…
Dragon Slayer on July 16, 2009 at 5:38 am said:

Or you could run this
http://programs.rcrnet.net/#version
labilbe on August 6, 2009 at 3:44 pm said:

Thank you!
Exactly what I needed.
L33tCh on December 3, 2009 at 7:32 am said:

Don’t need to cut for ubuntu… just ‘lsb_release -sr’ does the trick.
dan on December 28, 2009 at 11:38 am said:

on debian:
uname -a
debian version:
cat /etc/debian_version
BiSScuiTT on March 1, 2010 at 11:04 pm said:

For scripting a quick and easy way would be to source /etc/lsb-release. This will make all the variables in /etc/lsb-release available to the script.

Example:

#! /bin/bash
source /etc/lsb-release
echo $DISTRIB_RELEASE
freebourg on September 25, 2010 at 10:10 am said:

As checked today, “/etc/debian_version” contains the version number.

I think you didn’t read the post correctly. Don’t use “/etc/debian_version” to know your Ubuntu version.

On Lenny, this file contains: 5.0.6
and on Ubuntu 10.04.1 this file is filled with “squeeze/sid”, which is correct because Ubuntu is built on Debian Testing.

Good point BiSScuiTT. I think the lsb_release script just reads that so sourcing this is the best way to do it.
V on October 11, 2010 at 8:55 pm said:

My install does not have a debian_version file, OR a lsb_release file in /etc.

The scripts fail. Even uname -a doesn’t tell me which version of Debian Linux I am running… it just tells me what my KDE version is, plus letting me know as an aside that I’m running Linux.

I swear to you it is a Lenny Debian distro of the linux operating system. I know it’s 5.*.* but that’s about it.

I vaguely remember that aptitude has some kind of clever trick for finding out what version of linux you are running, but I checked the aptitude help files and no dice.

Help?

Here’s the output to uname -a
Linux mcgee 2.6.26-2-686 #1 SMP Thu Sep 16 19:35:51 UTC 2010i686 GNU/Linux

I know that I’m not running Debian version 2.6.26. That’s absurd. Besides, I’ve done this before, (used uname) and it’s even told me that it’s Lenny and everything.

I’m stumped.
sharif jamadar on December 10, 2010 at 11:02 am said:

i want todays version of obuntu linux. i have seminar on obuntu linux so pls help me
goodtimetribe on January 9, 2011 at 4:49 am said:

@V

Per the Debian documentation, if the /etc/debian_version file does not exist, then it was not installed from official Debian installation disks.

http://www.debian.org/doc/FAQ/ch-software.en.html#s-isitdebian

However, any of the LSB files should be there as LSB is Linux Standard Base. If for some reason you find yourself without it (i guess it could happen, in Lenny? i doubt it…) , install the package.
athensguy on March 19, 2011 at 4:16 pm said:

@V

uname -r reveals the Linux kernel version.

For example:
# uname -r 2.6.35-28-generic
kiran kumar on May 20, 2011 at 5:44 am said:

Thankq for your information. its help full.
Francis on September 22, 2011 at 2:11 pm said:

Why not look at /proc/version ?

On Ubuntu:
Linux version 2.6.24-27-server (buildd@palmer) (gcc version 4.2.4 (Ubuntu 4.2.4-1ubuntu4)) #1 SMP Wed Mar 24 10:39:18 UTC 2010

On Debian:
Linux version 2.6.26-2-686 (Debian 2.6.26-15) ([email protected]) (gcc version 4.1.3 20080704 (prerelease) (Debian 4.1.2-25)) #1 SMP Thu Mar 26 01:08:11 UTC 2009

That should be a reliable way of finding out ….
stasik on October 12, 2011 at 9:44 pm said:

on debian wheezy i type in the console: lsb_release -d
i still dont know how to check the version (6.0.3 or something like that)
nxegr on November 2, 2011 at 8:52 am said:

the cmd lsb_release -a ,for unbutu is useful.
Bonelli on November 26, 2012 at 7:30 pm said:

Thank you!
Genie on October 23, 2014 at 2:27 pm said:

You can use also cat /etc/os-release and number is in /etc/debian_version

20 thoughts on “Find which Debian or ubuntu Linux Version you are running”

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