Install guide · Debian 12 (bookworm)printed 28 Oct 2026, 13:15 UTC
Install nano 9.3 on Debian 12
Debian 12 ships nano 7.2. The current release is 9.3. freshdeb builds it for bookworm from upstream's release with Debian's packaging, so it replaces the distribution's package in place and updates with apt upgrade like the rest of the system.
- Debian 12 ships
- 7.27.2-1+deb12u1
- main
- 9.3follows every upstream release, minors and majors included. Currently 9.3.
- Built for
- amd64 and arm64, natively
Not published yet. The first nano release is being built. These commands work once it lands; the version shown is the one it will publish.
1Trust the signing key (once per machine)
sudo install -d -m 0755 /etc/apt/keyrings curl -fsSL https://deb.freshdeb.com/freshdeb-archive-keyring.gpg \ | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/freshdeb-archive-keyring.gpg >/dev/null
Fingerprint 3BBD F03A 9C0B F890 F8CA 9510 7595 CC55 468F 3161. How to verify.
2Add the source for bookworm
sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/freshdeb-nano.sources >/dev/null <<EOF Types: deb URIs: https://deb.freshdeb.com/nano Suites: bookworm Components: main Signed-By: /etc/apt/keyrings/freshdeb-archive-keyring.gpg EOF
3Install
sudo apt update && sudo apt install nano
apt policy nano # expect 9.3-1+freshdeb~deb12Already on Debian 12's nano? The same command upgrades it: the freshdeb version sorts higher. What's different from Debian's package.
Upgrading from nano 7.2
What changed between Debian 12's 7.2 and 9.3 that you may notice. Configuration and data stay where Debian put them.
- Since 8.0
- ^F and ^B search forward and backward instead of moving the cursor, and M-F and M-B repeat the search. To get the old keys back, put
bind ^F forward main,bind ^B back main,bind M-F formatter mainandbind M-B linter mainin~/.nanorcor/etc/nanorc. - Since 8.1
- ^L cycles the current line to the center, the top and the bottom of the screen.
- Since 9.0
- M-< and M-> no longer switch between open files (
bind M-< prevbuf mainandbind M-> nextbuf mainbring that back), the ^T toggle between WhereIs and GotoLine is gone, and files in old Mac format, with a lone carriage return per line, are no longer read or written as such. - Also
- The package's NEWS entry lists the same, and apt-listchanges shows it during the upgrade.
Going back to 7.2
Delete /etc/apt/sources.list.d/freshdeb-nano.sources, run sudo apt update, then sudo apt install nano=7.2-1+deb12u1: apt asks before it downgrades. Name the other nano packages you installed with their Debian 12 version too.
