The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of available boot loaders.
| Name | License | It can reside in | Boot from | Can boot | |||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MBR only | MBR / VBR | Floppy | Hard disk | Second Hard disk | Logical partitions | CD-ROM | Floppy | USB | Zip | LAN | MS-DOS | Windows 9x/Me | Windows NT series | Windows Vista/7 | Linux | ReactOS | MenuetOS | *BSD | Mac OS X | ||
| Acronis OS Selector | Proprietary | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| AiR-Boot | GPL | Yes | No | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Barebox | GPL v2 | Yes | No | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Boot Camp | Proprietary | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| BootIt Next Generation | Proprietary | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| BootKey | Proprietary | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| bootman | MIT | Yes | No | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | Yes | Yes | Boots NTLDR | Boots Windows Boot Manager | Boots GRUB or LILO | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| BootX (Apple) | Proprietary | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| BootX (Linux) | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Darwin Boot Loader | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes |
| Das U-Boot | GPL | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Yes (FreeBSD) | ? |
| GAG | GPL | Yes (SafeBoot) | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes | Calls NTLDR | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Calls GRUB or LILO | Calls bootloader | Calls bootloader | Calls bootloader | No |
| GRUB | GPL | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NTLDR Chain-loading supported | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Yes | Calls FreeLoader | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GRUB2 | GPL | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NTLDR Chain-loading supported | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Yes | Calls FreeLoader | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GRUB4DOS | GPL | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Calls NTLDR | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Gujin [1] | GPL | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| LILO | BSD license | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Calls NTLDR | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Calls biosboot (FreeBSD, PC-BSD, ...) | ? |
| loadlin | GPL | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No | ? | ? |
| Madboot | Proprietary | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| MasterBooter | Proprietary | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| NTLDR | Proprietary | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | No | No | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Calls GRUB4DOS | ? | ? | ? | Calls Darwin bootloader[1] |
| OSL2000 Boot Manager | Proprietary | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Calls GRUB or LILO | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| PLoP Bootmanager | Freeware | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Calls GRUB or LILO | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| RedBoot | mod GPL | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NTLDR Chain-loading supported | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Yes | Calls FreeLoader | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Smart Boot Manager | GPL | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | ? |
| SPFdisk | Open source | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| SYSLINUX | GPL | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Calls NTLDR | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| XOSL | GPL | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | No | ? | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| zBoot Manager | Proprietary | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Windows Boot Manager | Proprietary | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Calls NTLDR | Yes | Calls GRUB or LILO | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| FreeLoader (ReactOS Boot Loader) | GPL | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Partial[2] | Calls Windows Boot Manager | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? |
| Name | Software license | It can reside in | Boot from | Can boot | |||||||||||||||||
| MBR only | MBR / VBR | Floppy | Hard disk | Second hard disk | Logical partitions | CD-ROM | Floppy | USB | Zip | LAN | MS-DOS | Windows 9x/Me | Windows NT series | Windows Vista | Linux | ReactOS | MenuetOS | *BSD | Mac OS X | ||
| Name | Advanced command | Scriptable | Supported architecture | Supported filesystem | Supported OS | Supported executable | Supported protocol | Supported decompression | Others |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GRUB Legacy | Yes | No | i386(pc) | FAT16, FAT32, MINIX fs, Linux ext2fs, ReiserFS, JFS, XFS, VSTa fs | FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, GNU/Linux | ELF | TFTP | gzip | |
| GRUB 2 | Yes | Yes | i386(PC, coreboot, OLPC, Mac), PowerPC(Mac, Pegasos II), Sun UltraSPARC(SPARC v9) | ext2, ext3, ext4, btrfs, zfs, ufs, minix, iso9660, udf, jfs, hfs, hfs+, afs, affs, sfs, xfs, reiserfs, tar, cpio, ntfs, FAT16, FAT32 | Linux(PC, mac), FreeBSD(pc), OpenBSD(pc), NetBSD(pc) | ? | ? | ? | |
| LILO | No | No | i386(PC) | agnostic | ? | ? | ? | bzip2, gzip | |
| LOLO (Logic PD) | Yes | Yes | ARM7, ARM9, ARM11, Cortex-A8, StrongARM, SH, ColdFire | FAT16, FAT32, YAFFS1, YAFFS2 | Linux, WinCE | ELF, binary, BIN (WinCE), SREC | TFTP | Supported devices: MCF54xx, MCF5329, MCF5373, LLH7A400, LLH7A404, LLH79520, LLH79524, LSH7727, LSH7750, LSH7760, PXA270, PXA320, IMX31, IMX27, OMAP35xx, OMAP37xx | |
| SYSLINUX | ? | ? | ? | ext2, ext3, FAT | GNU/Linux, ? | ? | ? | ? | |
| Yaboot | No | No | PowerPC(Open Firmware) | ext2, ext3, ? | GNU/Linux, ? | ? | ? | ? | |
| RedBoot | yes | yes (boot only) | ARM, ColdFire, H8300, x86, Freescale/Motorola 68000, MIPS, PPC, SH, SPARC, SPARCLite | JFFS2 | Linux, eCos | ELF | TFTP, serial (X-modem) | gzip | |
| Das U-Boot | Yes | Yes | PPC, ARM, AVR32, Blackfin, ColdFire, IXP, Leon2, m68k, MicroBlaze, MIPS, NIOS, NIOS2, PXA, x86, StrongARM, SH2, SH3, SH4, ... | FAT, VFAT, ext2, ext3, jffs2, cramfs, reiserfs, yaffs2, ubifs, nfs | 4_4bsd, Artos, Dell, Esix, FreeBSD, Irix, Linux, LynxOS, NCR, NetBSD, OpenBSD, pSOS, QNX, RTEMS, SCO, Solaris, SVR4, U-Boot, VXworks | ELF, U-Boot image format | TFTP, NFS, serial (S-Record, Y-Modem, Kermit binary protocol) | bzip2, gzip, lzma | |
| Barebox | Yes | Yes | ARM, Blackfin, NIOS2, MIPS, x86, PPC | FAT, VFAT, cramfs, nfs | Linux | ? | TFTP, NFS, serial (S-Record, Y-Modem) | bzip2, gzip, lzma | |
| kboot | ? | ? | i386, PowerPC64 | most supported by Linux Kernel (ext2, ext3, ext4, reiserfs, xfs, jfs, etc..) | Linux | ? | HTTP, FTP, TFTP | ? | SSH, NFS support. kexec-based bootloader. |
| Runnix | ? | ? | ? | ? | Linux | ? | ? | ? | kexec and SYSLINUX based bootloader. |
| kexec-loader | No | No | i386 | most supported by Linux Kernel (ext2, ext3, ext4, reiserfs, xfs, jfs, etc..) | Linux/multiboot | ? | No networking | gzip (for kernel modules) | Kernel/multiboot module support |
| NTLDR | No | No | i386(PC) | ? | Windows | ? | ? | ? | default bootloader on Windows NT |
| FREELDR | No | No | i386(PC), ARM, PowerPC | ext2, FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, ISO, NTFS | ReactOS, Linux, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows 2003 | ? | ? | ? | clone of NTLDR |
| boot0 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | FreeBSD's bootloader |
| extipl | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | IBM IPL upper compatible |
| Multiple Boot Manager | ? | ? | ? | ? | PC DOS, MS-DOS, Windows, OS/2, Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, BeOS, B-right/V, Solaris, OpenStep, Plan 9, EOTA[3] | ? | ? | ? | |
| bootload (Technologic Systems) | ? | ? | ARM | ? | Linux | ? | ? | ? | Proprietary |
| Name | Advanced command | Scriptable | Supported architecture | Supported filesystem | Supported OS | Supported executable | Supported protocol | Supported decompression | Others |