Frequently Asked Question

What makes pacman different from apt and dnf?

pacman is Arch Linux's package manager, written in C, deliberately small (around 30,000 lines of source) and exceptionally fast. Its single-letter flags are terse but consistent: -S to sync (install or upgrade from a repository), -R to remove, -Q to query the local database, -U to install a single file. pacman -Syu ("sync, refresh the database, upgrade everything") is the canonical daily command on an Arch system, and it is expected to be safe because Arch is a rolling release, there is no separation between "stable" and "current".

What sets pacman apart from apt and dnf is the philosophy around it more than the tool itself. Arch packages are small, contain minimal patches over upstream, and arrive in lockstep, so the resolver rarely has to make difficult choices. There is no autoremove because the recommended workflow is to install with pacman -S --asdeps for dependencies, and the orphan list (pacman -Qdt) catches anything left over. The AUR (covered separately) extends pacman's reach to source builds.