# siderolabs/talos

Talos Linux is a modern Linux distribution built for Kubernetes.

Repository: https://github.com/siderolabs/talos
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/talos
Homepage: https://siderolabs.com/talos-linux
Language: Go
License: MPL-2.0
License Family: copyleft
Topics: linux, linux-distribution, kubernetes, kubernetes-distribution, go, musl, grpc, cloud-native, containerd
Last push: 2026-08-26T21:39:37+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 99/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 98, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3225, "days_push": 7, "days_rel": 14, "gap_med": 12.0, "n_releases_24m": 51}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 11024, forks 880 (observed 2026-08-28T04:10:45.889305+00:00)

## What it is
Talos Linux is a minimal, immutable, API-managed Linux distribution purpose-built for running Kubernetes. It ships no shell, SSH, or package manager, and is managed entirely through a declarative gRPC API secured with mutual TLS.

## Use cases
- run kubernetes on bare metal
- minimal secure os for k8s nodes
- immutable linux distro for containers
- boot a kubernetes cluster in minutes
- manage k8s nodes via api without ssh
- homelab kubernetes operating system
- edge kubernetes node os

## When to choose
- you want a hardened, minimal OS dedicated to Kubernetes nodes
- you prefer API-driven, declarative node management with no SSH access
- you need atomic, predictable upgrades and rollback on cluster nodes
- you run bare metal, VM, or edge Kubernetes and want fast provisioning

## When to avoid
- you need a general-purpose Linux distro with a shell and package manager
- your workloads require running software directly on the host OS outside containers
- you depend on SSH-based tooling or traditional configuration management on nodes

## Facets
- artifact type: application
- maturity: stable
- function: container-orchestration, security, configuration-management, deployment, self-hosted
- domain: cloud-computing, operating-systems, infrastructure-as-code
- platform: go, cli, self-hosted, cloud
- tags: kubernetes-os, immutable-linux, minimal-distro, grpc-api, bare-metal, edge, containers, devops, linux

## Member repositories
- siderolabs/talos (main) score 99

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:10:45.889305+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 2026-08-29T17:17:12.579910+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/siderolabs/talos (fetched 2026-08-28T04:10:45.889305+00:00, sha 01eb7f9eb87c)
  - homepage: https://siderolabs.com/talos-linux (fetched 2026-08-29T08:15:43.990392+00:00, sha 6850a0f25b63)
  - site_page: https://docs.siderolabs.com/latest (fetched 2026-08-29T08:15:43.994997+00:00, sha 180f04381a3e)
  - site_page: https://docs.siderolabs.com/talos (fetched 2026-08-29T08:15:43.996664+00:00, sha 180f04381a3e)
  - site_page: https://www.siderolabs.com/about-us (fetched 2026-08-29T08:15:44.000127+00:00, sha efdb91a527fe)
  - site_page: https://www.siderolabs.com/pricing (fetched 2026-08-29T08:15:43.993228+00:00, sha fcc7a0331ea3)
  - site_page: https://www.siderolabs.com/omni (fetched 2026-08-29T08:15:43.998299+00:00, sha 786357f91269)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.