# pbatard/rufus

The Reliable USB Formatting Utility

Repository: https://github.com/pbatard/rufus
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/rufus
Homepage: https://rufus.ie
Language: C
License: GPL-3.0
License Family: copyleft
Topics: usb, iso, bootable-drives, mbr, uefi, bios, boot, windows, syslinux, freedos, grub, grub4dos, sha1, sha256, md5, gpt, windows-to-go, persistence, secure-boot, rufus
Last push: 2026-08-24T12:00:31+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 92/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 78, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 5401, "days_push": 9, "days_rel": 64, "gap_med": 63, "n_releases_24m": 10}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 37436, forks 3148 (observed 2026-08-28T04:12:01.419801+00:00)

## What it is
Rufus is a free, portable Windows utility for formatting USB drives and creating bootable media from ISO or disk images. It supports BIOS and UEFI booting, Windows To Go, persistent Linux partitions, and checksum verification of images.

## Use cases
- create a bootable windows 11 usb installer
- make a bootable linux usb drive from an iso
- create a windows to go portable workspace on a usb stick
- bypass tpm and secure boot requirements for windows 11 installation
- create a persistent linux usb with saved data
- verify iso checksum before writing to usb
- check a usb flash drive for fake capacity or bad blocks

## When to choose
- you need to write a bootable ISO or disk image to a USB drive on Windows
- you want UEFI or BIOS bootable media, including NTFS-based UEFI boot
- you need Windows To Go or persistent Linux partitions
- you want a portable, no-install tool with checksum verification

## When to avoid
- you need to create bootable media on Linux or macOS
- you need multi-boot USB drives with many ISOs
- you want to clone entire disks rather than create bootable installers

## Facets
- artifact type: application
- maturity: stable
- function: gui, file-system, security, developer-tools
- domain: developer-tools, operating-systems, windows, cross-platform
- platform: windows
- tags: bootable-usb, iso-to-usb, uefi, windows-to-go, portable, usb-formatting, boot-media, desktop

## Member repositories
- pbatard/rufus (main) score 92

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:12:01.419801+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T16:25:38.356466+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/pbatard/rufus (fetched 2026-08-28T04:12:01.419801+00:00, sha 7006dbe21109)
  - homepage: https://rufus.ie (fetched 2026-08-29T07:47:12.453280+00:00, sha c8076183890e)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.