balenaetcher ☆

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Description:
Tool to flash OS images to SD cards & USB drives

Type: Cask | Latest Version: 2.1.6@0 | Tracked Since: Dec 17, 2025

Links: Homepage | @balena_io | formulae.brew.sh

Category: Developer tools

Tags: usb sd-card bootable imaging flashing utility

Install: brew install --cask balenaetcher

About:
BalenaEtcher is a powerful, open-source utility designed to safely and reliably flash OS images onto SD cards and USB drives. It provides a streamlined graphical interface that prevents users from accidentally wiping their system drives. The tool supports raw image formats, ensuring fast and verified writing of bootable media for various operating systems.

Key Features:

Cross-platform support (macOS, Windows, Linux)
Drive selection protection to prevent data loss
Built-in image validation and bad block handling

Use Cases:

Creating bootable USB installers for Linux distributions
Flashing Raspberry Pi SD cards with IoT operating systems

Alternatives:

Raspberry Pi Imager – More focused on Raspberry Pi images but lacks support for other raw formats.
dd (command line) – Powerful but dangerous; lacks GUI and safety checks.

Version History

Detected	Version	Change	Commit
May 13, 2026 9:14pm	2.1.6	VERSION_BUMP	620d5701
Jul 29, 2025 12:43pm	2.1.4	VERSION_BUMP	2b0aadac
Jun 20, 2023 7:05pm	1.18.8	VERSION_BUMP	fcf99724
Mar 4, 2023 12:10am	1.18.4	VERSION_BUMP	f470a5c7
Feb 9, 2023 9:02am	1.14.3	VERSION_BUMP	ad1b91cb
Nov 8, 2022 11:07pm	:latest	VERSION_BUMP	aa46cd55
Nov 8, 2022 6:42pm	1.8.14	VERSION_BUMP	b4b7e651
Nov 8, 2022 6:40pm	1.8.10	VERSION_BUMP	5e9a1783
Nov 8, 2022 9:53am	1.8.3	VERSION_BUMP	9c3a65b4
Nov 8, 2022 8:48am	1.8.0	VERSION_BUMP	381400d1
Nov 8, 2022 3:53am	1.8.4	VERSION_BUMP	0330e160
Nov 7, 2022 10:02pm	1.8.6	VERSION_BUMP	a68f30ec
Nov 7, 2022 9:54pm	1.7.14	VERSION_BUMP	40644cfd
Nov 7, 2022 8:05pm	1.7.11	VERSION_BUMP	b8deda5b
Nov 7, 2022 5:12pm	1.7.10	VERSION_BUMP	2644ba70