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GNU GRUB vs rEFInd

GNU GRUB

gnu.org

rEFInd

rodsbooks.com

Side by side

FigureGNU GRUBrEFInd
Price from—Free
Free plan—Yes
Free trial——
Open source—Yes
WindowsYesYes
macOS—Yes
LinuxYesYes
Self-hosted—Yes
Plans published01
Spec score · Boot Manager Software5.7 (#28)8.3 (#8)

Plans

GNU GRUB

No plans published.

GNU GRUB pricing →

rEFInd

  • rEFIndFree

rEFInd pricing →

In their own words

GNU GRUB

GNU GRUB has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.

Visit gnu.org

rEFInd

rEFInd is a free boot manager, forked from rEFIt, that scans for boot loaders and lets users select an operating system or utility at startup. It is intended for EFI-based computers, not older BIOS-based machines, and works with EFI 1.1 and UEFI 2.x. It can find EFI loaders, BIOS/CSM/legacy loaders, and boot options saved in firmware NVRAM. For Linux, rEFInd can detect kernels with EFI stub support, locate initrd files, and read kernel options from a refind_linux.conf file. It supports text and graphical operation, with configurable resolution, backgrounds, icons, and fonts. It can communicate with Shim to authenticate boot loaders using valid UEFI Secure Boot keys, Shim keys, or Machine Owner Keys. Included filesystem drivers cover ext2/3, ext4, Btrfs, ReiserFS, HFS+, and ISO-9660; the NTFS driver is not compiled by default. Downloads include ZIP, RPM, Debian, CD-R image, and USB flash drive image packages. Installation scripts and manual procedures cover Linux, macOS, and Windows. The maker describes it as beta-quality, with uneven testing across architectures.

Visit rodsbooks.com