Debian 12 Bookworm was released in June 2023 and represents two years of development, testing, and stabilization. It ships with over 11,000 new packages compared to Debian 11, totaling more than 64,000 packages available from the official repositories. The release includes Linux kernel 6.1 LTS, which will receive upstream maintenance through December 2026.
Key improvements over Debian 11 include non-free firmware integration in the default installer, a modernized Python 3.11 stack, PHP 8.2 for web applications, and PostgreSQL 15 with improved query performance. The upgrade to systemd 252 brings better boot reliability, improved logging, and predictable network configuration.
Security is enhanced across the board with OpenSSH 9.2, which disables RSA-SHA1 signatures by default and adds support for FIDO2 hardware security keys. The default firewall framework is nftables, providing a modern replacement for iptables with better performance and cleaner syntax.