Installing Miniconda#

This page contains Miniconda installation instructions for Windows, MacOS, and Linux. For a command-line quickstart installation, see Quick Command Line Install.

Note

On Windows, macOS, and Linux, it is best to install Miniconda for the local user, which does not require administrator permissions and is the most robust type of installation. However, if you need to, you can install Miniconda system wide, which does require administrator permissions.

Windows installation

  1. Download the installer from the Anaconda website or by using your preferred command line interface:

    On anaconda.com/download, register with Anaconda, scroll down and select the 64-bit Windows Miniconda installer.

    Open a Command Prompt window and run the following command:

    curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe --output .\\Downloads\\Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe
    To install a different version

    View a full list of Miniconda installers in the official Miniconda archive.

    To download a different version of Miniconda, copy the Filename of an installer from the Miniconda archive, then download it using a curl command:

    # Replace <FILENAME> with the installer Filename you copied from the Miniconda archive
curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/<FILENAME> --output <FILENAME>

    Caution

    Ensure that you are downloading an installer that is compatible with your operating system!

    Open a PowerShell window and run the following command:

    wget "https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe" -outfile "./Downloads/Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe"
    To install a different version

    View a full list of Miniconda installers in the official Miniconda archive.

    To download a different version of Miniconda, copy the Filename of an installer from the Miniconda archive, then download it using a wget command:

    # Replace <FILENAME> with the installer Filename you copied from the Miniconda archive
wget "https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/<FILENAME>"" -outfile "./Downloads/<FILENAME>"

    Caution

    Ensure that you are downloading an installer that is compatible with your operating system!

  2. (Recommended) Verify the integrity of your installer to ensure that it was not corrupted or tampered with during download.

    How do I verify my installer’s integrity?

    To ensure that your downloaded installer has not been tampered with or corrupted, generate its SHA-256 hash value and compare it to the official hash provided in the archive.

    1. Open PowerShell and run the following command:

      # Replace <INSTALLER_FILE> with the name of the downloaded installer file
Get-FileHash .\Downloads\<INSTALLER_FILE> -Algorithm SHA256

      For example:

      Get-FileHash .\Downloads\Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe -Algorithm SHA256

    2. Note the generated SHA-256 hash value from the output.

    3. Visit repo.anaconda.com/miniconda to find the official SHA-256 hash for your installer.

    4. Compare the hash values. If they match, the installer is safe to use.

    Tip

    For more information, see cryptographic hash verification in the official conda documentation.

  3. Go to your Downloads folder (or Home folder if downloaded via CLI) and double-click the installer to launch.

    Caution

    To prevent permission errors, do not launch the installer from the Favorites folder.

    Note

    If you encounter issues during installation, temporarily disable your anti-virus software during install, then re-enable it after the installation concludes. If you installed for All Users, uninstall Miniconda and re-install it for Just Me only.

  4. Click Next and then agree to the License Agreement.

  5. Select an installation option:

    • Just Me (Recommended) - Install Miniconda for the current user account.

    • All Users - Install Miniconda for all user accounts on the computer (requires Windows Administrator privileges).

  6. Click Next.

  7. Select a destination folder to install Miniconda, then click Next.

    Caution

    • The installation directory path cannot contain spaces or Unicode characters. For more information, see the FAQ.

    • Do not install as Administrator unless admin privileges are required.

  8. Customize your installation options:

    • Create shortcuts - Selected by default. Creates Start Menu shortcuts for the Anaconda Prompt packages. Deselecting this option skips creating these shortcuts.

    • Add Miniconda3 to my PATH environment variable - Adds the path that contains the conda binaries to your PATH environment variable.

      Anaconda does not recommend selecting this option. The conda binaries path contains other package binaries, which are permanently added to your PATH environment variable, even if no conda environment is currently active. This makes it possible for other software to use these package files, which might lead to errors.

      Note

      Unless you plan on installing and running multiple versions of Miniconda or Python, open Anaconda Prompt from the Start Menu to begin your environment management work.

    • Register Miniconda3 as my default Python 3.12 - Selected by default. Registers the Python package in this install as the default Python for programs like VSCode, PyCharm, etc.

    • Clear the package cache upon completion - Runs conda clean --all --force-pkgs-dirs after the install finishes. For more information on these commands, see the conda command documentation.

  9. Click Install. The installation might take a few minutes to complete. Click Show details to view the packages being installed.

  10. Click Next twice, then click Finish to close the installer.

For information on installing in silent mode, see the Quick command line install commands for examples or the Installing in silent mode section of Installing on Windows in the conda project documentation.

MacOS/Linux installation

Caution

The graphical installer for MacOS installs Miniconda into /opt/miniconda3 in your file system. If you want to install Miniconda into your Home directory or if you have multiple users on a system and want to manage your installation more carefully, Anaconda recommends the shell (or command line) installer.

  1. Download the .pkg installer. Miniconda is a smaller version of the Distribution installer and is now available through the Anaconda website.

  2. (Optional) Anaconda recommends verifying the integrity of the installer after downloading it.

    How do I verify my installer’s integrity?

    To ensure that your downloaded installer has not been tampered with or corrupted, generate its SHA-256 hash value and compare it to the official hash provided in the archive.

    1. Open Terminal and run the following command:

      # Replace <FILE_NAME> with the path to your installer
shasum -a 256 <FILE_NAME>

      For example:

      shasum -a 256 ~/Downloads/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-arm64.pkg

    2. Note the generated SHA-256 hash value from the output.

    3. Visit repo.anaconda.com/miniconda to find the official SHA-256 hash for your installer.

    4. Compare the hash values. If they match, the installer is safe to use.

    Tip

    For more information, see cryptographic hash verification in the official conda documentation.

  3. Double-click the .pkg file.

  4. View the Read Me instructions and click Continue.

  5. Read through the License Agreement and click Continue, then click Agree to agree to the terms.

  6. Choose an install location:

    • Install for all users of this computer (Recommended) - Installs Miniconda into /opt/miniconda3 for all users of the computer.

    • Install on a specific disk - Enables you to choose a different location to install Miniconda.

  7. Click Install. When the installation finishes, open your terminal application.

    Note

    You should see (base) in the command line prompt. This tells you that you’re in your base conda environment. To learn more about environments, see Environments.

  8. Test your installation by running conda list. If conda has been installed correctly, a list of installed packages appears.

  1. Download the .sh installer using the following command:

    curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-arm64.sh

    curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-x86_64.sh
    To install a different version

    View a full list of Miniconda installers in the official Miniconda archive.

    To download a different version of Miniconda, copy the Filename of an installer from the archive, then download it using a curl command:

    # Replace <FILENAME> with the installer Filename you copied from the archive
curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/<FILENAME>

    Caution

    Ensure that you are downloading an installer that is compatible with your operating system!

  2. (Optional) Anaconda recommends verifying the integrity of the installer after downloading it.

    How do I verify my installer’s integrity?

    To ensure that your downloaded installer has not been tampered with or corrupted, generate its SHA-256 hash value and compare it to the official hash provided in the archive.

    1. Open Terminal and run the following command:

      # Replace <FILE_NAME> with the path to your installer
shasum -a 256 <FILE_NAME>

      For example:

      shasum -a 256 ~/Downloads/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-arm64.sh

    2. Note the generated SHA-256 hash value from the output.

    3. Visit repo.anaconda.com/miniconda to find the official SHA-256 hash for your installer.

    4. Compare the hash values. If they match, the installer is safe to use.

    Tip

    For more information, see cryptographic hash verification in the official conda documentation.

  3. Install by running the following (depending on your macOS architecture):

    bash ~/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-arm64.sh

    bash ~/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-x86_64.sh

  4. Press return to review the license agreement. Then press and hold return to scroll.

  5. Enter yes to agree to the license agreement.

  6. Press return to accept the default install location (PREFIX=/Users/<USER>/miniconda3), or enter another file path to specify an alternate installation directory. The installation might take a few minutes to complete.

  7. Choose an initialization options:

    • Yes - conda modifies your shell configuration to initialize conda whenever you open a new shell and to recognize conda commands automatically.

    • No - conda will not modify your shell scripts. After installation, if you want to initialize, you must do so manually. For more information, see Manual Shell Initialization.

  8. The installer finishes and displays, “Thank you for installing Miniconda3!”

  9. Close and re-open your terminal window for the installation to fully take effect, or use the following command to refresh the terminal:

    source ~/.bashrc

    Note

    You should see (base) in the command line prompt. This tells you that you’re in your base conda environment. To learn more about environments, see Environments.

  10. Test your installation by running conda list. If conda has been installed correctly, a list of installed packages appears.

Manual Shell Initialization

Once installation has successfully completed, initialize your shell by running the following command:

# Replace <PATH_TO_CONDA> with the path to your conda install
source <PATH_TO_CONDA>/bin/activate
conda init --all

Note

MacOS 10.15 and later use zsh as the default shell. Once installation process has completed, initialize conda in a zsh shell by running the following commands:

source <PATH_TO_CONDA>/bin/activate
conda init zsh

For information on installing in silent mode, see the Quick command line install commands for examples or the Installing in silent mode section of Installing on macOS in the conda project documentation.

  1. Download the latest version of Miniconda by opening a terminal and running one of the following commands (depending on your Linux architecture):

    curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh

    curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-aarch64.sh

    curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-s390x.sh
    To install a different version

    View a full list of Miniconda installers in the official Miniconda archive.

    To download a different version of Miniconda, copy the Filename of an installer from the archive, then download it using a curl command:

    # Replace <FILENAME> with the installer Filename you copied from the archive
curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/<FILENAME>

    Caution

    Ensure that you are downloading an installer that is compatible with your operating system!

  2. (Optional) Anaconda recommends verifying the integrity of the installer after downloading it.

    How do I verify my installer’s integrity?

    To ensure that your downloaded installer has not been tampered with or corrupted, generate its SHA-256 hash value and compare it to the official hash provided in the archive.

    1. Open Terminal and run the following command:

      # Replace <FILE_NAME> with the path to your installer
sha256sum <FILE_NAME>

      For example:

      sha256sum ~/Downloads/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh

    2. Note the generated SHA-256 hash value from the output.

    3. Visit repo.anaconda.com/miniconda to find the official SHA-256 hash for your installer.

    4. Compare the hash values. If they match, the installer is safe to use.

    Tip

    For more information, see cryptographic hash verification in the official conda documentation.

  3. Install Miniconda by running one of the following commands (depending on your Linux architecture):

    bash ~/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh

    bash ~/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-aarch64.sh

    bash ~/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-s390x.sh

  4. Press return to review the license agreement. Then press and hold return to scroll.

  5. Enter yes to agree to the license agreement.

  6. Press return to accept the default install location (PREFIX=/Users/<USER>/miniconda3), or enter another file path to specify an alternate installation directory. The installation might take a few minutes to complete.

  7. Choose an initialization options:

    • Yes - conda modifies your shell configuration to initialize conda whenever you open a new shell and to recognize conda commands automatically.

    • No - conda will not modify your shell scripts. After installation, if you want to initialize, you must do so manually. For more information, see Manual Shell Initialization.

  8. The installer finishes and displays, “Thank you for installing Miniconda3!”

  9. Close and re-open your terminal window for the installation to fully take effect, or use the following command to refresh the terminal:

    source ~/.bashrc

    Note

    You should see (base) in the command line prompt. This tells you that you’re in your base conda environment. To learn more about environments, see Environments.

  10. Test your installation by running conda list. If conda has been installed correctly, a list of installed packages appears.

Manual Shell Initialization

Once installation has successfully completed, initialize your shell by running the following command:

# Replace <PATH_TO_CONDA> with the path to your conda install
source <PATH_TO_CONDA>/bin/activate
conda init --all

Note

MacOS 10.15 and later use zsh as the default shell. Once installation process has completed, initialize conda in a zsh shell by running the following commands:

source <PATH_TO_CONDA>/bin/activate
conda init zsh

For information on installing in silent mode, see the Quick command line install commands for examples or the Installing in silent mode section of Installing on macOS in the conda project documentation.

Verify your install

Verify your installation of Miniconda by using the CLI:

  1. Access the CLI for your operating system:

    1. Search for “Anaconda Prompt” in the taskbar search.

    2. Select Anaconda Prompt.

    1. Use Cmd+Space to open Spotlight Search.

    2. Type “Terminal” and press return to open.

    In most Linux distributions, use Ctrl+Alt+T to open a terminal application.

    You should see (base) in the command line prompt. This tells you that you’re in your base conda environment. To learn more about environments, see Environments.

  2. Run any conda command. For example:

    • conda list - Displays a list of packages installed in your active environment and their versions.

    • conda --version - Displays conda’s version number.

Quick command line install#

These quick command line instructions will get you set up quickly with the latest Miniconda installer. For best results, open a new command line window, copy all of the commands in each code block, and run them all at once.

Caution

These quick install commands run a silent install. If you run a silent install, you are accepting Anaconda’s Terms of Service (TOS) by default. Please make sure to review Anaconda’s full TOS here before proceeding with silent installations.

These three commands quickly and quietly download the latest 64-bit Windows installer, rename it to a shorter file name, silently install, and then delete the installer:

curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe -o miniconda.exe
start /wait "" .\miniconda.exe /S
del miniconda.exe
To install a different version

You can find different versions of the Windows installer at https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda.

For example, to install an older version of Miniconda for Python 3.12 for a 64-bit Windows computer, run the following curl command instead:

curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-py312_24.5.0-0-Windows-x86_64.exe -o miniconda.exe

After installing, open the “Anaconda Prompt (miniconda3)” program to use Miniconda3.

These three commands quickly and quietly download the latest 64-bit Windows installer, rename it to a shorter file name, silently install, and then delete the installer:

curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Windows-x86_64.exe -o miniconda.exe
Start-Process -FilePath ".\miniconda.exe" -ArgumentList "/S" -Wait
del miniconda.exe
To install a different version

You can find different versions of the Windows installer at https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/.

For example, to install an older version of Miniconda for Python 3.12 for a 64-bit Windows computer, run the following curl command instead:

curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-py312_24.5.0-0-Windows-x86_64.exe -o miniconda.exe

After installing, open the “Anaconda Powershell Prompt (miniconda3)”.

These four commands download the latest M1 version of the MacOS installer, rename it to a shorter file name, silently install, and then delete the installer:

mkdir -p ~/miniconda3
curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-MacOSX-arm64.sh -o ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh
bash ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh -b -u -p ~/miniconda3
rm ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh
To install a different version

You can find different versions of the MacOS installer at https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda.

For example, to install an older version of Miniconda for Python 3.12 for an M1 MacOS computer, run the following curl command instead:

curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-py312_24.5.0-0-MacOSX-arm64.sh -o ~/miniconda/miniconda.sh

Or to install an older version of Miniconda for Python 3.9 for an Intel chip MacOS computer, run the following curl command instead:

curl https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-py39_24.5.0-0-MacOSX-x86_64.sh -o ~/miniconda/miniconda.sh

After installing, close and reopen your terminal application or refresh it by running the following command:

source ~/miniconda3/bin/activate

To initialize conda on all available shells, run the following command:

conda init --all

These four commands download the latest 64-bit version of the Linux installer, rename it to a shorter file name, silently install, and then delete the installer:

mkdir -p ~/miniconda3
wget https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh -O ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh
bash ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh -b -u -p ~/miniconda3
rm ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh
To install a different version

You can find different versions of the MacOS installer at https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda.

For example, to install an older version of Miniconda for Python 3.12 for an 64-bit version of Linux, run the following wget command instead:

wget https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-py312_24.5.0-0-Linux-x86_64.sh -O ~/miniconda/miniconda.sh

After installing, close and reopen your terminal application or refresh it by running the following command:

source ~/miniconda3/bin/activate

To initialize conda on all available shells, run the following command:

conda init --all
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