The i386 architecture has long been obsolete, and from this week, support for i386 in Kali Linux is going to shrink significantly: i386 kernel and images are going away. Images and releases will no longer be created for this platform.
Some terminology first
Let’s start with the terms used in Kali Linux to talk about CPU architectures. These terms apply more generally to any Debian-based Linux distribution.
amd64refers to the architecture, ie. the original 32-bit x86 architecture.
What’s changing
First, the Linux kernel: starting version 6.11 (that just landed in Kali rolling), the kernel is no longer built for the i386 architecture.
Second, and as a direct consequence: the Kali Linux images. We will no longer build the i386 and the i386 .
If you’re impacted by this change and need more guidance to run your i386 binaries on Kali Linux, please reach out to us via our . Then the big year was 2019, with .
By the end of 2023, Debian agreed that it would . Then the 6.11 kernel was uploaded to Debian beginning of October, without i386 kernel package. It also means the end of i386 installer images.
Kali Linux is based on Debian, so it follows that Kali Linux also drops i386 kernel and images. This is going to be effective for weekly images starting 2024-W44, to be published on Monday 28th of October. It’s already effective for Kali rolling users.
What about packages, you may ask? i386 packages remain, as long as they can be rebuilt. Which means, as long as there are people to maintain it and fix i386-specific issues as they arise. One of the biggest area that keeps i386 alive is gaming: old games that were compiled for 32-bits x86 are still around, and enjoyed by gamers. Thanks to that, we can hope that a baseline of packages will remain for i386 for the time coming. And at the same time, we can expect other areas and ecosystems to drop i386 support as they see fit, to reduce maintenance efforts. So the overall number of i386 packages will slowly go down over the years, that’s for sure.
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