coreboot

coreboot
Original authors	Ronald G. Minnich, Eric Biederman, Li-Ta (Ollie) Lo, Stefan Reinauer, and the coreboot community
Release	1999 (1999)
Stable release	26.04  / 25 June 2026 (25 June 2026)
Written in	Mostly C, about 1% in assembly and optionally SPARK
Platform	IA-32, x86-64, ARMv7, ARMv8, RISC-V, POWER8
Type	Firmware
License	GPLv2-only
Website	www.coreboot.org
Repository	github.com/coreboot/coreboot

coreboot (formerly LinuxBIOS) is a free and open‑source project that provides lightweight firmware to initialize hardware and then load an operating system. It is designed to replace proprietary firmware (traditional BIOS or UEFI implementations) by performing the minimal tasks required to start a modern 32-bit or 64-bit operating system.

Because coreboot performs low‑level hardware initialization, it must be ported to each supported chipset and motherboard model; consequently, availability is limited to platforms for which support has been implemented.

One of the well‑known variants of coreboot is Libreboot, a software distribution that focuses on removing proprietary binary blobs from the firmware stack.