Before You Start
Asahi Linux is still in its Alpha release. As of now, you can’t run it on Mac Studio. Some of the features, like DisplayPort, GPU acceleration, and Touch Bar (for 13” MacBook Pro), don’t work yet. You can get the complete list of “What doesn’t” work on the official announcement page. Although, in my usage, I found that Bluetooth works just fine, but the official announcement page said it is not working.
Installing Asahi Linux
Asahi Linux has a self-explanatory installer. As long as you understand and answer the on-screen prompts, you are good to go. Note: make sure to keep a backup of your important data before starting the installation process. This will download and execute the shell script to install Asahi Linux.
Resizing Your macOS Partition
You will see how much space you will have freed up after resizing. Press y and Enter to continue and start resizing your partition.
Installing Asahi Linux on the New Partition
Completing Asahi Linux Setup Screen
Installing Packages on Asahi Linux
You can use pacman to install any package for arm64 architecture from official Arch Linux repositories. Learn all about pacman here. For example, to install node.js, run: and press Y and Enter to confirm. You can also build a package from the source and install it if you want to.
Using macOS and Asahi Linux Together
Asahi Linux is made to run alongside your macOS. However, when you turn your Mac on, it will boot by default into Asahi Linux. To boot into macOS, press and hold your power button until you see “Entering startup options” or a spinner, then select Macintosh HD and press “Continue.”
Uninstalling Asahi Linux
You can uninstall Asahi Linux by deleting the partitions for Asahi Linux. In my case, the line is “EFI EFI – MINIX,” and the identifier is “disk0s4.” Make sure to replace “YourDiskIdentifier” with the actual disk identifier. To delete a partition, select the partition and press the “–” button. Make sure to delete the correct partitions. The first partition’s name will be your Linux OS’s name. The second partition is named “drive,” which is around 500MB. The third partition is the partition for Asahi Linux’s home directory, which will display the home directory’s size of Asahi Linux. (It will be closer to the size of your total allocated storage for Asahi Linux.) Click “Apply” to apply the changes you just made to your partitions. This will open a new window with the partition names you are going to delete. Select “Partition.” It will take some time, and your Mac may temporarily appear to be frozen, which is totally normal. Select “Done” when the process completes.
Fixing the Boot Screen
Your Mac will continue to start as usual.
